KESHO DATT Vs. PANCHAYATI ADALAT

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS application under Article 226 of the Constitution was referred to a large Bench as the learned Judges wanted an authoritative decision on the point, whether a Panchayati Adalat can under the U. P. Panchayat Raj Act (Act 26 of 1947) appoint a commissioner to make a local investigation and make a report?

(2.) THE facts, so far as can be ascertained from the papers on the record, are that one Shiam Lal filed a complaint against four persons that they had committed an offence under Section 447, penal Code, inasmuch as they had broken down a mendh which separated the field of the complainant from their field and had planted mustard seed crop on the land belonging to the complainant. The Panchayati Adalat Bench issued a commission to Sampat Singh the Sarpanch and one Roshan Singh, who though on the panel of panches was not a member of this Bench of the Panchayati Adalat, to make a report as regards the condition of the field after a local inspection. The two commissioners went to the spot and made a report to the effect that the mendh separating the two fields appeared to have been recently dug up and freshly planted with mustard seed, that the mustard plants on the portion where the 'mendh' had existed had not attained the height of the plants on the field of the complainant. The Panchayati Adalat took this report into consideration, along with the other evidence in the case, and recorded a finding that the accused were guilty under Section 447, Penal Code, and sentenced them to pay a fine.

(3.) A revision was filed against that order before the Sub-Divisional Magistrate, in which the decision of the Panchayati Adalat was attacked on several grounds, but no point was made of the fact that the Panchayati Adalat had issued a commission. The Sub-Divisional Magistrate went into the points raised before him and held that there was no miscarriage of justice and dismissed the revision.