MUZAFFAR SHAH Vs. ABLI LONE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) IN Mahinder Pal Versus Mst. Kailash Devi, 1980 KLJ. 150, it has been held that Section 19(3) (8) of the Jammu and Kashmir Agrarian Reforms Act, contemplates suits and proceedings between a recorded owner or intermediary on one hand, and the party in possession on the other in which the right to possess is claimed or disputed. It has further been held that such suits and proceedings would include suits and proceedings in which the party in possession had pleaded adverse possession as a ground of claim or defence. In the present case, the dispute is with regard to Khalisah and Shamilar land. The parties claim possessory title to the exclusion of one another. Consequently it does not fulfil the conditions set out above. If that be so, the case is not triable by the Collector under Section 19 (3) (c) of the Act, on which turns the claim that the Collector and not the civil court had jurisdiction to try the suit.

(2.) IN this view, the initial order of the lower appellate court transferring the case for disposal to the Collector is clearly without jurisdiction. Accordingly the order of the Collector returning the appellate the lower appellate court, can not be said to be unjustified. The insistence of the lower appellate court that the Collector should comply with the order, is ill founded. All that the lower appellate court could ask the Collector to do was to determine whether in consequence of the Agrarian Reforms Act, the disputed land had devolved upon one party, or the other or none of them from the appointed date. I say so because further proceedings of the appeal will depend upon the determination of this question and the power and jurisdiction to determine this question lies exclusively with the Collector under Section 25 of the Act.

(3.) THE result, therefore, is that this revision succeeds and is allowed. The impugned order of the lower appellated court is set aside. The lower appellate court is directed to make a fresh order, after summoning the other party, in accordance with law keeping in view the observations made above. The party present is directed to appears before the trial court on 30th of Sept: 1981.