JOSE Vs. CHACKO JOSEPH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The common petitioner in these revisions holds 1 acre and 11/2 cents of land in a Panchayat area. There are three kudikidappus in them. On the application of the kudikidappukars, the Land Tribunal allowed each of them to purchase 6 1/3 cents under S.80A of Act 1 of 1964. The appellate authority concurred. Clause (a) of Sub-s.(4) of S.80A provides that where there are more kudikidappukars than one in the lands held by a person, the maximum extent available for purchase by all of them will be 10 cents, when the total extent held by such person is less than one acre. Clause (b) fixes the extent available for purchase as 20 cents, when the total extent held by such person is one acre or more, but less than two acres. And the petitioner's only contention is that the sites of the huts or homesteads occupied by the kudikidappukars have to be excluded in computing the extent of the land held by him, in which case the matter Would be governed by clause (a), and not clause (b), as held by the tribunals below.

(2.) It is urged that the petitioner has been holding the land as "owner", that the term denotes absolute proprietorship under S.2(40), and that in view of S.75 which in effect gives fixity to kudikidappukars, he had ceased to be the owner of the lands comprised in the kudikidappus with effect from 1-4-64. Such fixity, it is said, detracts from absolute proprietorship I am unable to accept this position for the simple reason that if the petitioner had ceased to be the owner of those lands, there was no need at all for the kudikidappukars to purchase them. He could not have transferred to them what had ceased to be his. S.80B and 80C show that the right, title and interest of the landowner in respect of the land allowed to be purchased vest in the kudikidappukars only when an order allowing purchase is passed by a competent tribunal. The kudikidappukaran docs not become owner of the kudikidappu by virtue of S.75; the owner is not divested of ownership until purchase certificate is issued under S.80C(2). A restriction on ownership is different from extinguishment of those bundle of rights which constitute ownership.

(3.) The second point is based on clause (c) of S.80A(12) where under "the sites of the buildings and other structures situate on the land"