MRIDULA MISHRA Vs. STATE OF BIHAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) HEARD .

(2.) THE petitioners in this writ application have challenged an order passed by the Circle Officer, Kadwa in a proceeding under Sec. 48D of the Bihar Tenancy Act (In short "B.T. Act"). It appears that an application was filed by the private respondents supported by an affidavit (Annexure -2) wherein they claimed that their father Bhola Singh was cultivating the said land of one Dev Nath Rai the father of the petitioners since twenty five years and after the death of their father for the last four years they have ' been cultivating the land and sharing the crops. Thus, they qualified to be an under raiyat having acquired occupancy right and should now be declared raiyats which virtually has the effect of declaring them to be the settlees of the land in question. The order on the face of it appears to be an ex parte order and a reference thereto would show two important aspects. Firstly, so far as noticing petitioners is concerned, the order itself points out that as their father was the person who used to look after the lands and petitioners ' address was not known or available in the office, therefore, notices were issued to the petitioners on the address of the father of the petitioners. It is not disputed that the lands belong to the petitioners. The second thing that comes in forefront is that in the order, even though ex parte, it is clearly mentioned that the father of the private respondents was in fact an employee of the petitioners and it is in that capacity, he was living on the said land. This fact is of also greater relevance as the private respondents themselves state in their affidavit that their father was in cultivating possession for over twenty five years but their father, admittedly, never brought any action under Sec. 48D of the B.T. Act so long as he was alive. Action was brought soon after his death. These two facts clearly show that the proceedings were taken up without proper notice to the raiyat in question which is infraction of the mandatory provisions as engrafted under Sec. 48D of the B.T. Act. One must keep in mind that a proceeding under Sec. 48D of the B.T. Act virtually deprives a person of his land as the tenant thereon becomes the landlord himself and that too for a meagre compensation of a couple of hundred rupees being twenty four times the yearly ground rent paid to the State. Where the consequences are so drastic, the Courts would generally require strict compliance of all procedural safeguards that are available to a party. Admittedly, as per the impugned order itself, notices cannot be said to have been validly served. That by itself is enough to render the order invalid and liable to be set aside.

(3.) THE private respondents, four in number, were noticed. Notices have been validly served. Two of them chose to appear but none is present. The other two have chosen not to appear: