CHAIRMAN RAMAPPA GUNDAPPA SAHAKARI SAMYAKTA BESAVA SANGHA LIMITED CHAIRMAN RAMAPPA GUNDAPPA SAHAKARI SAMYAKTA BESAVA SANGHA LIMITED Vs. STATE OF MYSORE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The appellant in Civil Appeal No. 602 of 1971 is a co-operative society claiming to consist of members who are "local landless backward class people". It has come to this Court by special leave against the judgment of the High Court of Mysore (now Karnataka), having been deprived of the leasehold right granted to it pursuant to the order of Government dated July 17, 1968. Although the term of the lease, namely, five years, has by now expired, still the finding of the High Court is sure to injure the claims of the petitioner society in future and so we proceed to consider the subject-matter on the merits.

(2.) Considerable lands had been acquired in the last century in the village of Gudas in Belgaum District by the Government of Bombay on the score that they were likely to be submerged by the construction of weir on the river Ghataprabha. However, during summer when the storage of water would shrink, the lands on the contours would be exposed for a whole season and could be put to agricultural use. Therefore, the Government of Bombay resolved by Ex.A of 1898 that such lands could be "let annually for cultivation to such persons and on such terms as may be decided soon", and a further policy decision was taken regarding the persons to whom the lands might be given for seasonal cultivation, and the resolution of Government ran to the effect that "in consideration that the original holders have been dispossessed for a public purpose. Government are pleased to direct as a matter of grace that they should have the first option of cultivating their former holdings" (emphasis added)

(3.) A few decades later, the same Government, by Ex. D, dated June 19, 1931, passed a "resolution", which is the foundation of the claim of the writ petitioners in the High Court (respondents 4 and 5 in this appeal) and had better be fully reproduced here at this stage: