GANGA RAM Vs. FINANCIAL COMMISSIONER (REVENUE) HARYANA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This order will dispose of L.P.As. 53, 54 and 55 of 1972 arising out of three writ petitions (C.Ws. 3179, 3180 and 3181 of 1971) which were disposed of by one judgment by the learned Single Judge. The three writ petitions, which were directed against the orders of the Financial Commissioner remanding the three cases to the Assistant Collector, IIGrade for deciding the same after hearing the parties, were accepted by the learned Single Judge.

(2.) Brief facts which are necessary for the decision of these appeals are that three applications were filed by different landlords against different tenants for ejectment on account of non-payment of rent. Notices were sent by the Assistant Collector, II Grade. A report was received, supported by an affidavit by the process-server, that the respondents have refused service and that, consequently, he has pasted the copies of the notices on the residential houses of the respondents. On the basis of the report, ex parte proceedings were taken and ultimately orders of ejectment were passed in execution of which the tenants were dispossessed.

(3.) The tenants filed appeals before the Collector which were admittedly beyond time from the date of the orders of the Assistant Collector. It was urged before the Collector that they had come to know about the orders of ejectment very late, and that from the date of the knowledge the appeals were very much in time. It was contended that no proper service in accordance with law had been effected on them. The Collector, however, dismissed these appeals on merits as well as on the ground that they were beyond time inasmuch as in one case the appeal was instituted on 11th June, 1968, whereas the Assistant Collector II Grade had passed the order on 20th November, 1967, and in the other two cases the appeals were filed on 17th June, 1968, while the orders of the Assistant Collector were passed on 20th January, 1968. The Collector refused to extend the time under Section 5 of the Limitation Act.