STATE OF PUNJAB Vs. MAKHAN LAL ETC

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an appeal filed by the State under clause 10 of the Letters Patent against the order of Mehar Singh, J. accepting a petition filed under Article 226 of the Constitution by two brothers Makhan Lal and Sis Ram and quashing an order passed by the Director, Consolidation of Holdings exercising the powers of the Government under Section 42 of the East Punjab Holdings (Consolidation and Prevention of Fragmentation) Act of 1948, dated the 15th of September, 1958.

(2.) The facts are that consolidation had taken place in Jamalpur, the village of the petitioner and the three non-official respondents in the writ petition, and the final scheme was published and repartition carried out during 1950. Nearly two years later in May, 1958 Onkar Singh, Chandu Lal and Sajjan Singh respondents presented an application to the Minister for the provision of a path through a part of the land of the petitioners to enable them to take a tractor and trailer to their own land by short direct route, it being necessary for them otherwise to take their tractor and trailer by one or other of two roundabout routes which were interrupted by a number of bunds. It was urged that this would be in the interest of the 'Grow More Food Campaign' The matter was referred by the Minister to the Director, Consolidation of Holdings, for disposal under Section 42 of the Act and the latter caused the parties to appear before him at Gurgaon on the 15th of September, 1958 when the impugned order was passed extending an already existing path up to the boundary of the village and at the same time compensating Makhan Lal for the land of which he was being deprived in order to provide the path by giving him an equivalent amount of land from the western side of a field in the plot of Onkar Singh respondent.

(3.) The learned Single Judge accepted the contention of the petitioners based on the wording of Section 42 which, as it stood at that time reads :-