MUNSHI RAM Vs. STATE OF HARYANA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS judgment of ours would dispose of C. W. P. No. 8740 of 1976 (Munshi Ram etc. v. State of Haryana etc.), C. W. P. No. 5178 of 1978 (Diwan Singh etc. v. State of Haryana etc.) and S. A. O. No. 54 of 1977 (Teja etc. v. Jit Ram etc.) as common question of law arises in all these cases. It appears that at the time of motion hearing of the aforesaid cases, it was projected by the learned counsel for the petitioners/appellant that there was a conflict between the two Division Bench judgments of this Court in the Karnal Co-operative Farmers Society Limited v. Gram Panchayat 1976 Pun LJ 237, and Digh Ram v. State of Haryana 1977 Pun LJ 446, with regard to the interpretation of S. 13-B as added by Haryana Act No. 34 of 1974 in the Punjab Village Common Lands (Regulation) Act (18 of 1961) (hereinafter referred to as the Act ). As is evident from the order of the Bench in C. W. P. No. 8740 of 1976, dated 6th of April, 1977, a conflict was apparently found in the two aforesaid Division Bench judgments, with the result that the matter was referred to a larger Bench and that is how we are seized of the matter.

(2.) BEFORE I advert to the merits of each case, I propose to deal with the alleged conflict as was tried to be brought out by the learned counsel for the petitioners appellant at the time of hearing.

(3.) IT was contended that in Karnal Co-operative Farmers Society's case, the view taken by the learned judges of the Division Bench was that only such suits which had been instituted in the Civil Courts against the Panchayat for exclusion of certain lands or other properties from Shamilat-deh under S. 2 (g) or on any of the grounds mentioned in S. 4 (3) of the Act alone could be transferred while in Digh Ram's case (to the decision of which I Was a party), it has been held that S. 13-B provides for all claims based on the ground of any land or other immovable property being excluded from Shamilat-deh. The relevant observations in Karnal Co-operative Farmers Society's case read as under:-'' a reading of this section shows that the suits pending in Civil Court against the Panchayats, wherein relief has been claimed on the ground that the land be excluded from Shamilat-deh, shall be transferred to the Assistant Collector 1st Grade. Emphasis has been laid by Mr. Anand Swaroop, on the words 'excluded' and 'against the Panchayat,' which I have underlined in the section reproduced above. , It is noteworthy that the suits which are contemplated to be transferred from the Civil Court, to the Assistant Collector 1st Grade, must have two ingredients, namely (i) it should be for exclusion of the land from the Shamilat-deh, and (ii) it should be against the Panchayat. In case any suit does not contain the aforesaid ingredients, it cannot be transferred by the Civil Court to the Assistant Collector 1st Grade. It is a well known principle of interpretation of statutes that where the grammatical construction is clear and manifest, that construction ought to prevail unless there is some strong reason to the contrary. In case the language of the statute is unambiguous, the Court must give effect to it, and it has no right to extend its operation in order to carry out the supposed intention of the Legislature. It is the duty of the Court to take the statute as it stands and to construe its words according to its natural significance. The intention of the Legislature is to be given effect as expressed in the words used in the statute. No outside consideration can be called in aid to find that intention. In the above section, in my view, the words used by the Legislature, are clear and unambiguous. They cannot be interpreted in such a way that all the cases relating to the Shamilat-deh, pending in the Civil Court, shall be transferred to the Assistant Collector 1st Grade. If the intention of the Legislature has been to that effect, the language of the section would have been different. In my view, S. 13-B covers only such suits which have been instituted in the Civil Courts against the Panchayat for exclusion of certain lands or other properties from Shamilat-deh under S. 2 (g) or on any of the grounds, mentioned in S. 4 (3) of 1961 Act. A suit instituted by a Gram Panchayat for declaration to the effect that certain land should be included in Shamilat-deh, is not covered by the provisions of the aforesaid section.