GOPALAN Vs. LEKSHMI AMMA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Whether partial use for his residential purpose by the revision petitioner of a building put up by him on a plot of land belonging to the first respondent, the land owner, in pursuance of the permission granted by her under Ext. D-1 deed of the year 1125 M.E. for erecting a building for conducting a tea shop, would entitle the revision petitioner to claim rights of a kudikidappukaran as defined in S.2(25) of the Kerala Land Reforms Act, for short the Act, is the question that arises for decision in this revision.

(2.) The petition under S.80A and 80B of the Act for the purchase of kudikidappu filed by the revision petitioner was allowed by the Land Tribunal; however, on appeal the Appellate Authority reversed the order of the Land Tribunal and dismissed the application. The reasoning behind the decision of the Appellate Authority could be gathered from the following passage extracted from the judgment of that Authority:

(3.) Sri S. Parameswaran, counsel for the revision petitioner, submitted that the Appellate Authority did not properly grasp the scope and ambit of Explanation 2A to S.2(25) of the Act. According to him, the fact that the initial permission granted to the revision petitioner was to put up a building for a commercial purpose would riot by itself preclude him from claiming kudikidappu right if the building in his occupation was used also for residential purpose from a period not later than the 16th day of August 1968, and such use continued till the Ist day of January 1970. What is relevant, according to Sri Parameswaran, is not the purpose for which the permission was initially granted, but the actual use to which the building was put to during the material item He placed reliance on the following passage from the decision of Krishna Iyer J. in Joseph v. Antony (1971 KLR 291):-