Gram Panchayat, Village Sukhia Nangal vs Additional Director, Consolidation of Holdings, Punjab.

R.S. Mongia, J. (Oral)

This judgment of mine will dispose of civil Writ Petition Nos. 3411, 3410, 4856 and 1985, as common questions of law and facts are involved and that is why these cases are being disposed of together.

For narration of facts, Civil Writ Petition No. 3411 of 1985 is being adverted to. Some time before 195859, consolidation proceedings under the East Punjab Holdings (Consolidation and Prevention of Fragmentation) Act, 1948 (hereinafter called the Act) were initiated and some land was reserved for common purposes. The land which was reserved for common purposes was entered by the Consolidation Authorities in the name of the Gram Panchayat. Respondents Sohan Singh and others preferred a petition under Section 42 of the Act, challenging the porceedings held under Section 21(1) of the Act, paying that area of Khewat Nos. 61/71 to 78 had been wrongly entered in the name of the Gram Panchayat in the Jamabandi for the year 195859; whereas the respondents herein were in occupation of the land as shareholders for a very long time. According to them, the Jamabandi of Samvat 201011 carried an entry to the effect that the respondents were in possession of the land in dispute. The prayer was that they were entitled to hold on to the land as owners and the land did not vest in the Gram Panchayat. The Additional Director, Consolidation of Holdings, vide his order dated 4th March, 1985 (copy Annexure P3) allowed the petition of the present respondents and held that the preexisting entries in favour of the respondents, viz, "Shamlat Deh Hasab Rasad Khewat" should continue instead of the entry being in the name of the "Nagar Sabha". The case was remanded back to the Consolidation Officer for correcting the entry regarding it in the Khewat and for partitioning the land of the respondents. The Gram Panchayat has come up in the present writ petitions challenging the order of the Additional Director, Consolidation of Holdings, referred to above.

The primary contention of the learned counsel for the petitioner is that the land in question was Banjar Qadim and had been reserved for common purposes, during the consolidation of holdings in the village and was actually being uses for common purposes, inasmuch as the Gram Panchayat was leasing out the land to various persons and the respondents were in possession of the land in dispute as tenantsatwill of the Gram Panchayat and, therefore, the entry regarding the land in dispute that the same belonged to the Nagar Sabha, was correct and the respondents had no right or title in the land inasmuch as the land stood reserved for the common purposes.

On the other hand, learned counsel for the respondents, submitted that the land in dispute was never used for common purposes and the private respondent continued to be in possession of the land much prior to consolidation of holdings. It was further submitted that no land could be reserved for the income of the Gram Panchayat in the garb of reserving the same for common purposes. For this proposition, reliance was placed on the Supreme Court judgment in Bhagat Ram v. State of Punjab, 1967 PLR 287 as also a Division Bench judgment of this Court in Kala Singh v. Commissioner, Hissar Division, 1984 PLJ 169.

After hearing the learned counsel for the parties, I do not find any merit in the submissions of the learned counsel for the petitioners, rather I am of the opinion that there is substance in the contentions of the learned counsel for the respondents. It has been held by the Supreme Court in Bhagat Ram''s case (supra) that no land under the garb of common purposes can be reserved for the income of the Panchayat under section 18 of the Act and it would be hit by Article 31A of the Constitution of India if no compensation is paid to the rightholders on whom pro rata cut is applied for reserving the land. While dealing with the definition of ''Shamlat land'' under Section 2(g) of the Punjab Village Common Lands (Regulation) Act, 1961, the Divison Bench of this Court in Kala Singh''s case (supra), held that the land which is reserved for the income of the Gram Panchayat cannot be held to be ''Shamlat land'' under Section 2(g) of the Punjab Village Common Lands (Regulation) Act. This being the position in law, the Gram Panchayat could not claim that on the basis of the reservation of the land in dispute for common purposes, the same came to vest in it. The Additional Director, Consolidation of Holdings, was right in holding in the revenue record which existed prior to the consolidation in favour of the present respondents should continue.

No other point is urged.

For the reasons recorded above, I do not find any merit in these petitions and the same are dismissed. However, there will be no order as to costs.