RAJA RAM Vs. STATE OF UTTAR PRADESH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE petitioner was allotted chak No. 61 in proceedings under the U. P. Consolidation of Holdings Act. Respondents Nos. 4 to 6 were allotted chak No. 44. They filed an objection under Section 20 (2) but the objection was dismissed. Then an appeal was filed before the Settlement Officer (Consolidation) and the appeal was partly allowed and the chak was altered. The order of the Settlement Officer was made on March 14, 1963. A second appeal was then filed by the respondents before the Deputy Director of Consolidation. It was treated as a revision application and resulted in further modification of the chaks. The order of the Deputy Director disposing of the revision application is dated June 21, 1963. The petitioner Mas challenged that order by the instant petition for certiorari.

(2.) THE first question agitated before me is that the revision application before the Deputy Director was liable to be governed by Section 48 as it stood before its amendment on March 8, 1963 and consequently the Deputy Director had no jurisdiction to go into questions of fact and decide whether one chak or another had been properly constituted. The answer to this question is to be found in Section 47 of the U. P. Consolidation of Holdings (Amendment) Act, 1963. This Act substituted a new jurisdiction in Section 48 in place of the old. Whereas formerly the revisional jurisdiction extended only to errors of jurisdiction and to procedural irregularities or illegalities in the exercise of that jurisdiction, it was now considerably enlarged. If the case falls for consideration under the provisions of Section 48 as they stood before March 8, 1963, when the amendment Act came into force, the impugned order of the Deputy Director is clearly without jurisdiction. It is however, immune from challenge on the ground of want of jurisdiction if the conclusion is that the new section 48 applied. Now, Section 47 (1) of the Amendment Act declares that in units notified under Section 4 of the principal Act prior to the date on which the Amendment Act comes into force, all work in regard to, or connected with, consolidation operation beyond the stage of publication of the statement of proposal under section 20 of the principal Act, where on or before the said date that statement had already beenpublished shall be conducted and concluded in accordance with the provisions of the principal Act (namely, the unamended Act) as if the Amendment Act had not come into force. Then there is a proviso which reads: