STATE OF PUNJAB Vs. HARCHARAN KAUR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is defendant's second appeal against whom the suit for declaration has been decreed by both the Courts below.

(2.) The plaintiffs Harcharan Kaur and another, filed the suit for the grant of the declaration to the effect that they were the joint owners of the agricultural land measuring 48 kanals 12 marlas situated in village Thaska Tehsil Sunam District Sangrur. The mutation order, No. 150 sanctioned by the Assistant Collector, Second Grade, on November 29, 1974 and the entry regarding the symbolical possession at serial No. 140 in the roznamcha may be declared as void and inoperative against their rights and the defendant be restrained from making allotment of the land to any person and from dispossessing them. The suit was contested on the ground that the Civil Court had no jurisdiction to try the same as the land was declared surplus and the mutation to that effect was rightly sanctioned. The trial Court found that the mutation was wrongly sanctioned in favour of the State and that the entry made in the roznamcha was also illegal and void. The State Government failed to produce the order declaring the area to be surplus in the hands of the plaintiffs. Consequently, their suit was decreed. In appeal, the learned Additional District Judge affirmed the said findings of the trial Court and, thus, maintained the decree passed in favour of the plaintiffs. Dissatisfied with the same, the State has filed this second appeal in this Court.

(3.) Admittedly, no order declaring the area to be surplus was produced in the trial Court. Not only that not even at this stage, the State moved any application for producing the same by way of additional evidence. In the absence of any order declaring the area to be surplus in the hands of the plaintiffs, the mere sanctioning of the mutation in this behalf will not authorise the State Government to take over the possession of the suit land as surplus land from the plaintiffs. Thus, I do not find any infirmity or illegality in the concurrent findings of the two Courts below as to be interfered with in second appeal.