WAHIDI BEGUM Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Mst Wahidi. Begum has filed this petition under Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution of India for the issuance of an appropriate writ order or direction quashing the order of the Chief Settlement Commissioner, as well as the instructions issued, by the Deputy Secretary to the Government of Haryana, Rehabilitation Department.

(2.) The case of the petitioner is that her father Khan Sahib Abdul Ghafoor Khan had agricultural land in village Mohamadpur Sofar and Meghanwali Tehsil Fatehabad, District Hissar, that Khan Sahib Abdul Ghafoor Khan had not migrated to Pakistan at the time of the partition of the country and died at Hissar in 1955, that as he had stayed in India as an Indian national, on his application his property was restored to him by the Central Government, that on his death the petitioner succeeded to 1/4th share in the agricultural land left by him in these two villages, that the petitioner's entitlement for allotment of her share out of her father's property came to be 112-41/2 Standard Acres, that because of canal irrigation the value of the land having been increased, the petitioner was allotted 29.14 Standard Acres in lieu of the allotment to whic6 she was entitled, that this allotment had been made on the basis of the directions issued in letter No. 1 (33) G-1.23837-42/68, dated 30th of f 11 December, 1968 issued by the Deputy Secretary to Government, Haryana Rehabilitation Department, that the petitioner contested the allotment and that in the litigation failed up to the Chief Settlement Commissioner Haryana; who declined to interfere on the basis of the said instructions. It is on the basis of these facts that the present petition was filed.

(3.) In response to the notice b this Court, State of Haryana contested the case of the petitioner on various grounds. A preliminary objection about the maintainability of the writ was also raised as the petitioner had not availed of the alternate remedy available to her under Section 33 of the Displaced Persons (Compensation and Rehabilitation) Act 1954 (hereinafter referred to as the Act), Initially, when the petition came up for hearing before a learned single Judge of this Court the preliminary objection was pressed on behalf of the State of Haryana Finding some conflict in the judicial decisions of this Court the learned single judge vide his order dated 20th of October, 1978, referred the matter to a larger Bench.