SURJA Vs. ADDITIONAL DIRECTOR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioners are the rightholders of village Lisana, tehsil Rewari, district Gurgaon, and in their village the consolidation proceedings came to an end in 1960. The impugned order of the Additional Director, Consolidation of Holdings, Haryana at Gurgaon, dated December 24, 1967, shows that Mehar Chand and other Harijans of village Gokalgarh submitted applications to Shri Gurbanta Singh, the then Deputy Minister, on December 30, 1961, to the Block Development Officer on April 21, 1962, to Shri Chand Ram, the then Minister for Panchayats and Harijan Welfare, on August 4, 1962, to the Deputy Commissioner, Gurgaon, and again to Shri Chand Ram, the then Minister, a copy of which was sent to the Director, Consolidation of Holdings, Punjab, and Deputy Secretary, Consolidation, Chandigarh, and to Shri Bhagwat Dayal Sharma, the then Chief Minister, Ion November 11, 1966. The Deputy Commissioner forwarded the application to the Settlement Officer, who sent his proposal on February 2, 1967, recommending that a path may be provided for the Harijans of village Gokalgarh. The Deputy Commissioner forwarded the proposal of the Settlement Officer to the Financial Commissioner, Revenue, and a copy of the same was sent to the Additional Director, Consolidation of Holdings, who treated it as an application under Section 42 of the East Punjab Holdings (Consolidation and Prevention of Fragmentation) Act, 1948 (hereinafter referred to as the Act), and took suo motu action. The learned Additional Director inspected the spot and heard some of the rightholders. He was of the opinion that the provision of a path to the Harijans of village Gokalgarh was necessary, which should have been provided. He, accordingly, withdrew certain lands from the petitioners for that path by his order dated December 24, 1967. The present petition is directed against that order. No return has been filed by any of the respondents to the writ petition.

(2.) The impugned order deserves to be quashed on the ground that the provision for a path for the Harijans of another village is not the common purpose of the rightholders of the village, in which the consolidation took place. If the Government feels the necessity of providing a path through the lands of the rightholders of a village to the residents of the adjoining village, the land must be acquired for a public purpose after paying compensation. The lands of the petitioners could not be withdrawn from them without payment of compensation for providing a path to the Harijans of the adjoining village Gokalgarh.

(3.) Secondly, it has been stated in the petition that the petitioners were never given any notice of the proceedings by the Additional Director and so they could not be present nor were they afforded an opportunity of hearing, and the order was passed in violation of the mandatory provisions of Section 42 of the Act. This assertion has been made by the petitioners on affidavit which has not been contradicted and I must, therefore, presume it to be correct. The order, thus, suffers from a legal infirmity and is without jurisdiction. The writ petition is, therefore, accepted and the impugned order of the Additional Director, Consolidation of Holdings, Haryana at Rohtak, dated December 24, 1967, is hereby quashed. Since there is no representation for the respondents, I make no order as to costs. Petition accepted.