NAZAKAT ALI KHAN Vs. BANKEY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Nazakat All Khan, the appellant, filed a petition before His Highness the Nawab of Rampur sometime before the 1st of December 1949, praying that the order of the Board of Revenue, Rampur, dated the 22nd May 1949, be set aside. The State of Rampur merged with the United Provinces of Agra and Oudh in 1949. Paragraph 12, Clause (e) of The States' Merger (Governors' Provinces) Order, 1949, as amended by the States' Merger (United Provinces) Order, 1949, provided:

(2.) No appeal lay against the order of the Board of Revenue, Rampur. It must have been in the exercise of the royal prerogative that His Highness the Nawab of Rampur entertained such petitions and decided them. No such petition or appeal could have been instituted before this Court after the appointed day, i.e., the 1st of December 1949, against the orders which had been passed by the Board of Revenue, Rampur, prior to that date. This Court cannot therefore treat these proceedings to be proceedings instituted or commenced in this Court and consequently cannot hear and decide them as such proceedings. It follows that this appeal cannot be heard and must be rejected as not maintainable after the appointed day.

(3.) We accordingly reject this appeal, but make no order about costs of these proceedings. We also discharge the notice issued on the 13th of March 1953 to the opposite parties for the consideration of an application praying for the stay of the hearing of the appeal.