PARMESHWAR SINGH Vs. JOINT DIRECTOR CONSOLIDATION

JUDGEMENT

(1.) HEARD Mr. Mahesh Prasad No. 2 counsel for the petitioner. No one appears for the private contesting respondent No. 4 despite service of notice.

(2.) THIS writ petition arises from a consolidation proceeding involving the question of title.

(3.) THE petitioner before the court has lost before all the three authorities under the Consolidation Act. In regard to the disputed land the claim of the petitioner was confined only to its title. He admitted that the land was not under his possession but was under the possession and control of respondent No.4. The case of the petitioner was that the disputed plots were his ancestral land. He had taken a mortgage on the disputed land and on 22.7.1966 he had executed a registered deed of usufructurary mortgage bearing No. 5786 in favour of respondent No. 4. In 1975 -76 he filed a petition under Sec.12 of the Money Lenders Act for statutory redemption on expiry of the period of seven years. His petition for redemption was, however, rejected by order dated 13.3.1978 passed by the Dy. Collector, Land Reforms, Muzaffarpur in M.L. Case No. 7 of 75 -76. The order of the D.C.L.R. in the Money Lenders ' Case was produced before me from which it appears that he rejected the petition under Sec.12 of the Act mainly on the ground that it was filed before the expiry of the period of seven years from the date the possession of the land was handed over to respondent No. 4. From the order it appears that he held that the mortgage was partly simple and partly usufructuary and was, therefore, anomolous. The D.C.L.R. also upheld the case of respondent No. 4 that only part of the mortgage money was paid to the petitioner at the time of execution of the deed in the year 1966 and the balance amount was paid to him when the possession of the land was handed over in the year 1972. From 1972 the period of seven years not having expired the D.C.L.R. rejected the petition.