K THULASI Vs. A DHANAM

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The four Petitioners, who are residents of Andal Kuppam Village, Saidapet Taluk filed a revision under Section 83 of the Tamilnadu Land Reforms (Fixation of Ceiling on Land) Act, 1961 before the Tamil Nadu Land Reforms Special Appellate Tribunal, Chennai, challenging an order dated 03.04.2000. The said revision petition was not numbered.

(2.) In view of the abolition of the Tribunal, the matter stood transferred to this Court and was renumbered as CRP No. 1954 of 2003. However, a learned Judge of this Court opined that no Civil Revision Petition will lie as the officers whose orders under challenge were not a Court but only statutory authorities. Therefore, the CRP was converted into writ petition and notice was ordered.

(3.) The case of the Petitioners was that they are the legal heirs of late Kuppusamy who held land in S. No. 259/2A of Kadapakkam Village as cultivating tenant. After the demise of Kuppusamy, the Petitioners continue to hold the land as cultivating tenant under the Vennkkanna Chowdry Charity to whom the land belonged to. A proceeding under Land Reforms Act was initiated and notification under Section 18(1) was published in the Tamil Nadu Government Gazette on 24.03.1982declaring that the land measuring to the extent of 1.24 acres in S. No. 259/2A was surplus. In view of the declaration, the land so declared as surplus stood vested with the Government and it has to be allotted to landless poor in terms of Surplus Land Rules. Even among those landless poor, a person under holding of the land either as tenant or otherwise coming within the purview of landless poor can have a preferential claim over other persons.