SHANKARANARAYANA BHAT Vs. GIRIJA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Respondent-1 claiming to be a tenant in respect of Sy.No. 43/2b2 measuring 80 cents and Sy. No. 46/2 measuring 26 cents and another Sy. No. 46/1 indicate in Alike village, Bantwal Tlk. filed an application in Form-7 seeking occupancy right under S. 48A of the Kanataka Land Reforms Act, 1961 (herein aftir called the Act). The Land Tribunal having held an enquiry passed the impugned order, Annexure-K, dated 10.2.1981 granting occupancy right in favour of respondent-1 in respect of the first two survey numbers mentioned above. Aggrieved by the said order, the petitioner, land-owner, has approched this Court for relief. A few facts that are necessary for the disposal of the writ petition. are as follows.

(2.) It is not in dispute that originally the lands in question were held by one Jinnappa Gowda s o Kariya Gowda, on lease. It is allgeed in the writ petition that the said Jinnappa Gowda was a, chronic defaulter and, therefore, O.S. No. 504 of 1964 was filed against him in the Court of the Munsiff, Puttur, for the recovery of rents. That suit came to be decreed. Subsequently however Jinnapagowda filed an application under S. 25 of the Act in the Court of the Munsiff, as that Court had the powers to deal with it prior to the amendment of 1974. In that application, the applicant Jinnappagowda sought permission to surrender the lands held by him in favour of the landowner as he was unable to manage the lands paying rents. The Court by an order dt. 5.3.1968, Annexure- A, allowed the application permitting the applicant to surrender the lands in question. No appeal was filed against the said order and, therefore, it became final.

(3.) According to the averments in the writ petition, pursuant to the order, Annexure-A, Jinnappa Gowda surrendered the lands on the same day, as per Annexure-B which is dt, 5.3.1968. Thus here is an admission on the part of the petitioner that till the surrender of the lands in question, Jinnappa Gowda was the tenant cultivating them. Jinnappa Gowda ceased to be the tenant after the surrender. It is averred in the petition that Jinnappa Gowda's father Kariya Gowda had two wives. Respondent-1 is the daughter of Laxmi his first wife . The said Laxmi filed O.S. No. 63 of 1968 against the petitioner within a few days after the surrender by Jinnappa Gowda. She asserted in the said suit that she was in possesion of the properties on the ground, that her father was a tenant over 'he said lands and that her step brother being a man of weak intellect, could not surrender the said lands, This suit was, however, resisted by the petitioner. An interim order of temporary injunction was issued in the said suit on 23.11.1968. As against the. same, petitioner filed an appeal in M.A.No. 34 of 1968 in the Court of the Civil Judge, Mangalore. The appeal was allowed as per Anunexure -C observing that, prima facve , Laxmi, mother of respondent-1, could not, be in possession of the properties. This order was challenged by Laxmi in C.R. Ps 1670 and 1671 of 1969 before this Court. This Court allowed the CRPS. on 6.9.1971, set aside the order of the Civil Judge and remanded the matter to the trial Court, without going into the merits of the case, with a direction to dispose of the main suit itself, by observing that the plaintiff had the benefit of temporary injunction beyond three years.