STATE OF KERALA Vs. T V CHANDRAN

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The order before us is quite unsatisfactory and therefore we are constrained to interfere with it. It is the order of the Forest Tribunal, Calicut, on an application under S.8 of the Kerala Private Forests (Vesting and Assignment) Act, 1971 to declare 22.50 acres of land as outside the purview of Act 26 of 1971. There is no dispute with regard to 7 acres out of this. That is land cultivated and developed. The dispute concerns 15 1/2 acres, which according to the State was forest land and continued to be so on 10th May 1971. Without examining any witness and merely by reference to revenue receipts, Exts. P-3 to P-22, and documents Exts P-1, P-2 and P-23, the Forest Tribunal, Calicut has accepted the case of the petitioners before it

(2.) The mere fact that a person pays tax for a land does not prove his title to the land It may be taken as evidence of title along with such other material as is relevant in the matter of proof of title. The learned Tribunal seems to think that payment of tax for the disputed land by the claimants and acceptance of such tax by the revenue officials after 10th May 1971 would be a sufficient answer to the contention of the State. This idea is reflected in the observation made to the order thus:

(3.) The State has necessarily multifarious activities and it functions through its officers at various levels. What an officer does in the usual course atone end of the administration cannot normally operate as estoppel against the proper stand another officer or authority may take. When Kerala Private Forests (Vesting and Assignment) Act came into force, the officers of the Forest Department had necessarily to exercise themselves to find out the lands through the length and breadth of the State that are seen to have vested under the Act in the State. That called for enquiry, assessment and determination by the officers before they could take action. This naturally took time. In the meanwhile the fact that for such lands, which were ultimately claimed as vested in the State, tax was paid by a citizen and was received by the Village Officer, would not in any way disclose a stand of the Government that it is land which had not vested in the Government. There would have been no occasion for the Government to consider whether such land was vested or not when tax was offered to the Village Officer and was received by his, or even when the tax was collected by the village officer by employing the official process. There is no question of any waiver or relinquishment in such conduct. There is no question of any estoppel for estoppel would operate only where one party acts upon a representation by the other party. Therefore, to say that the receipt of tax after 10th May 1971 is by itself conclusive proof or even a material circumstance, would be erroneous.