CAPT OMESH KUMAR Vs. FINANCIAL COMMISSIONER

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This judgment of mine will dispose of five writ petition Nos. 2060 and 2188 to 2191 of 1972. In this Judgment. I am, however, referring the facts of Civil Writ No. 2060 of 1972.

(2.) The writ petition has been filed under Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution of India for quashing the orders of the Assistant Collector dated March 31, 1970 (Annexure-A); Collector dated December 22, 1970 (Annexure-B); Commissioner, dated August 17, 1971 (Annexure-C); and Financial Commissioner, dated March 8, 1972 (Annexure-D), in an application for purchase, filed by respondent No. 5 under Section 18 of the Punjab Security of Land Tenures Act, 1953 (hereinafter referred to as the Act).

(3.) The facts, which have led to this petition are that the petitioners, who are big landowners in village Kahnuwan, District Gurdaspur, filed separate application for selection of permissible area under Section 5-B(1) of the Act. Final orders on the said application were passed by the Collector, (Agrarian), in 1960. The land in dispute was included in the permissible area of the petitioners. The consolidation of holdings took place in the aforesaid village in 1961. After the consolidation, the petitioners filed applications for re-selection of their permissible area under Section 24A(2) of the Act. In those applications, the petitioners selected the same land with small variations which had been selected by them earlier under Section 5-B(1) of the Act. The applications have not so far been decided by the Collector (Agrarian). Santokh Singh, who is a tenant under the petitioners, filed an application under Section 18 of the Act, for purchase of land bearing killa Nos. 241/7/1, 8, 9, 11, 12, 13, 17, 18, 19 and 20. The said land is the same which had been selected earlier by the petitioners and had also been selected now by them in their applications filed under Section 24-A(2). The application for the purchase was allowed by the Assistant Collector on March 31, 1970, by his order, annexure-A. Appeal against that was dismissed by the Collector by his order dated December 22, 1970, annexure-B. Revision petitions against the said orders have been dismissed by the Commissioner, Financial Commissioner, by their orders dated August 17, 1971 and March 8, 1972, annexures C and D. The writ petitioners have challenged the aforesaid orders. Santokh Singh respondent No. 5, and the State have contested the said petition and denied the allegations of the petitioners. Respondent No. 5, has stated that the land in dispute was not included in the permissible area of the petitioners and the respondent Nos. 1 to 4 have come to the same finding. It was not the case of the petitioners that the land in dispute was included in permissible area of the petitioners in the year 1960 and they cannot be allowed to set up a new case in this writ petition. Under Section 24-A(2) of the Act, in 1968, they filed applications in Form-E for re-selection of their permissible area. No such applications were competent at that stage and they could be filed only within six months from the commencement of the Punjab Security of Land Tenures (Amendment) Act, 1957, that is December 20, 1957. The petitioners had no right to make a fresh selection. The application of respondent No. 5, for purchase of land under Section 18 of the Act, had been correctly allowed by the authorities under the Act. All the authorities had rightly given a finding that the land in dispute was never included in the selected area of the petitioners. The State, in the return, has taken similar pleas. The State, has, however, admitted that killa Nos. for which application has been made, are allotted on the old Khasra numbers bearing Nos. 2947 min, 2946 min, 2940 min, 2939 min, 2937 min. 2938 min, 2931 min, 2932 min, 2933 min, and 2929 min. The applications for re-selection of the land were decided by the Collector (Agrarian), Gurdaspur on February 24, 1971 with the direction that the petitioners should apply for some other numbers than those already purchased by the tenants vide order dated March 31, 1970 of the Assistant Collector 1st Grade, Gurdaspur. It is also submitted by the State that the orders passed by the authorities under the Act are valid, correct and legal and there are no sufficient grounds for quashing them.