AMARJIT SINGH Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This judgement will govern the disposal of the three writ petitions. These writ petitions arise from an order of forfeiture under the Smugglers & Foreign Exchange Manipulators (Forfeiture of Property) Act, 1976(hereinafter referred to as 'the SAFEMA Act'). These writ petitions challenge the Orders dated 12/2/2001; 14/2/2001 & 14/2/2001 respectively, passed by the Appellate Tribunal for Forfeited Property(hereinafter referred to as 'the Tribunal') under Section 12 of the SAFEMA Act by which Orders the Tribunal came to a finding that the Orders dated 20th of March, 1980 & 11th of October, 1979(which are the subject-matter of CW.1297/01; CW.1302/01 & 1538/01) of the Competent Authority under Section 7 of the Act were duly served on the appellant by affixture and in that view of the matter the Tribunal declined to condone the delay of about two decades in preferring the appeals before it and accordingly dismissed the appeals.

(2.) The Tribunal while dealing with the plea of the petitioners that the impugned orders of the Competent Authority were not served on them, found that that procedure as prescribed by Order V of Civil Procedure Code, 1908 is not applicable in so far as service of notices and orders under SAFEMA are concerned and the relevant procedure applicable is thus contained in Clause (a) of Section 22 of the SAPEMA Act. The Tribunal also found that the plea of the learned counsel for the petitioner/appellant before it that there was a requirement to affix the Order on the notice board of the ITO was not contained in Clause (b) of Section 22 of the SAFEMA Act and, therefore, found that the orders were served by affixture as required by Section 22(b) of the Act. The Tribunal also inter alia held as under:-

(3.) The learned counsel for the petitioners further challenges the existence of the witness of affixture, namely, Shri Kartar Singh Mahzabi whose thumb impression as a witness of signature is sought to be assailed by filing of an affidavit of Sarpanch of the Village. An affidavit seeking to lead evidence cannot be permitted to be filed in a writ petition and this affidavit cannot be considered. He has further sought to contend that mere reliance on thumb impression without the parentage of the person affixing the thumb impression cannot be relied upon in law. He further submits that such a plea was raised before the Tribunal though not noticed in the impugned orders. He further submits that there is no affidavit of a Competent Officer, stating that the impugned Orders have been served on the appellants/petitioners. The petitioners have not stated in the writ petition that this plea about the parentage of the person, affixing the thumb impression though raised before the Tribunal was not dealt with by the Tribunal. Accordingly, the petitioners cannot be permitted to raise this plea for the first time in a writ Court as the Court is bound to go by the records of the case as recorded by the Tribunal, particularly when it is presided over by a retired Judge of High Court. Furthermore a perusal of the impugned Orders also shows that the petitioners have chosen to stay away from the proceedings pending before the Competent Authority under Section 8 of the SAFEMA Act in spite of service. There is no dispute that the petitioners refused to accept the service of the notice for personal hearing, issued to them by the Competent Authority under the SAFEMA Act.