STATE OF PUNJAB Vs. QAISAR JEHAN BEIGUN

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an appeal by special leave from the judgment and order dated November 16 1959 passed by the Punjab High Court on an application in revision in respect of an order dated December 17,.1957 by which the learned Senior Subordinate Judge of Gurgaon held that a reference by the collector of Gurgaon under S. 18 of the Land acquisition Act (Act I of 1894) was incompetent by reason of the circumstance that it was made on an application filed beyond time. The appellant before us is the State of Punjab and the respondents are two ladies being related as mother and daughter. We shall presently state the relevant facts, but before we do so it is necessary to say that the only point on which the High Court disposed of the application in revision before it made by the respondents herein, was whether the civil court to which a reference is made by the Collector under S. 18 of the Land Acquisition Act on an application filed beyond time, can reject the reference on the ground that the reference made is incompetent. On this point there is a conflict of judicial opinion. In disposing of the application in revision the learned single judge who heard it proceeded on the basis that he was bound by the Division Bench decision of the same High Court in Hari Krishan Khosla vs. State of Pepsu, AIR 1958 Punj 490 which held that the jurisdiction of the civil court on a reference under S. 18 was confined to considering and pronouncing upon any of the four differed objections to an award under the Act which might have been raised in the written application for the reference and the civil court had no jurisdiction to decide the question of limitation. Therefore the learned single Judge did not go into the further question as to whether the application made for a reference in the present case was filed beyond time or not as prescribed by the proviso to S. 18 of the Act. That question has however been agitated before us by reason of the decision in Harish Chandra Raj Singh vs. Deputy Land Acquisition officer, (1962) 1 SCR 676 a decision of this court which was not available at the time when the learned single judge of the Punjab High Court disposed of the application in revision.

(2.) We proceed now to state the relevant facts. The respondents who were evacuees were owners of 55 bighas and 7 biswas of land in two villages Known as Salarpur and Nasirpur in the district of Gurgaon. Their lands in the aforesaid two villages along with lands of other persons in other villages were acquired by the appellant for use as a Field Firing and Bombing Range. The respondents were not notified about the acquisition and were not present at the time of the award. The respondents alleged and this was not denied, that the Collector treated the property as evacuee property and none of the notices contemplated by the Land Acquisition Act, 1894 were issued to them. The Collector made an award on October 25, 1953 by which he allowed compensation at the rate of Rs. 96/- per acre in respect of the lands of the respondents. On December 25, 1954 that is more than a year after the award, the respondents made an application to the Collector in which they said that certain agricultural lands of villages Salarpur and Nasirpur were compulsorily acquired by the Collector by an aware dated October 30, 1953 (October 30 was presumably a mistake for October 25), but they were not given any notice of the acquisition proceedings. The respondents further stated that the award had fixed the compensation to be given to the land owners affected by the acquisition, but the amount to be paid to each owner was not apportioned therein. The respondents then referred to a judgment and decree of the Lahore High Court dated November 13, 1944 under which they were held to be the owners of the lands in question. A prayer was made on behalf of the respondents for Payment of the compensation money at an early date for the purpose of defraying the expenses of a daughter's marriage, but without prejudice to the claim of the respondents for enhancement of the amount of compensation. The amount of compensation appears to have been paid on July 22, 1955 and on September 30, 1955 the respondents made an application to the Collector for a reference under S. 18 of the Act. In this application the respondents stated that they knew about the award on July 22, 1955 when they received the compensation amount and therefore the petition was within time. The principal objection which they raised to the award was that the market value of the land was not Rs. 96/- per acre as given in the award, but about Rs. 600/- per acre. The Collector accepted this application in a very short order which stated.

(3.) A reference was made accordingly to the civil court and the Senior Subordinate Judge of Gurgaon who heard it came to the conclusion that the application made to the Collector for a reference was barred by time, because the Collector's award was made on October 25, 1953 and the application for reference was made on September 30, 1955. The learned Subordinate Judge expressed some doubt as to whether the respondents were entitled to count the period of limitation from the date of knowledge but he held that even if they were entitled to do so, their date of knowledge must be taken to be December 24, 1954 on which date they made an application for interim payment and the application for reference having been made more than six months from the date of knowledge' the application was barred by time within the meaning, of the proviso to S. 18 of the Act. As to whether it was open to the civil court to go into the question of limitation the learned Subordinate Judge referred to the conflict of Judicial opinion and said that the preponderance of opinion was in favour of the view that the civil court could go into the question in order to find out whether the reference was competent or not. In this view of the matter, the learned Subordinate Judge discharged the reference on the ground that it was incompetent. It may be mentioned here that the Division Bench decision of the Punjab High Court in Hari Krishan Khosla's case, (supra) was not available to the learned Subordinate Judge on the day he passed his orders. The matters was then taken to the High Court on an application in revision by the respondents and we have already stated that the High Court dealt with it on the footing of the decision in Hari Krishan Khosla's case, (supra). The High Court accepted the application in revision, set aside the order of the learned Subordinate Judge and directed him to deal with the reference on merits. It is from this order of the High Court that the appeal has come to us by special leave.