Allahabad High Court
Shri Niwas vs Deputy Director Of Consolidation And ... on 5 December, 2003
Equivalent citations: 2004(1)AWC706
Author: S.N. Srivastava
Bench: S.N. Srivastava
ORDER S.N. Srivastava, J.
1. By means of the present petition, the petitioner has assailed the judgment dated 20.5.2002 passed by the Deputy Director of Consolidation.
2. The main grievance of the petitioner is that the petitioner was not assigned any of the plots including plot Nos. 1598 and 1605 of valuation of 60 paise consisting in his original holding in contrariety of the conditions laid down in Section 19 (1) of the U. P. Consolidation of Holdings Act. It appears from the record that after the death of Ram Swarup, the father of the petitioner, the property devolved upon petitioner and respondents 8 to 10. During consolidation proceeding, the Assistant Consolidation Officer proposed plots which according to the petitioner were Udan chak. The father of the petitioner ventilated his grievance by way of objection before the Consolidation Officer seeking Chak on Gate No. 1598. It would appear that the petitioner was recipient of very nominal relief and hence appeal was preferred and thereafter the matter was taken in revision. The revisional court did not interfere with the orders impugned and hence the present petition has been instituted for the reliefs.
3. The arguments of the learned counsel revolves round the contention that the grievance of the petitioner has been dealt with scantily and no cogent and convincing reason has been assigned by any of the Courts and further that impugned orders have been passed in antagonism of the conditions envisaged in Section 19 (1) of the U. P. Consolidation of Holdings Act. Per contra, Sri Ramendra Asthana, learned counsel representing the contesting opposite parties canvassed that the orders do not suffer from any infirmity or error and the allocation of the chaks has been rightly made according to the need and necessity of the situation on the spot and having regard to the conditions envisaged in Section 19 (1) of the Act.
4. Upon a consideration of the matter in its entirety, I am of the view that the orders impugned are scantily phrased and do not assign specific reason for their view of nudging off the petitioner from their original holding. Under the consolidation scheme, it is one of the requirements that the claims of the parties must be decided in a balanced manner giving cogent reasons and it is also explicit from the various decisions and the scheme of the Act that allotment of Udan Chak not containing any of his original holding should be avoided as far as possible. Section 19 (1) provides that every tenure holder is, as far as possible, allotted a compact area at the place where he holds the largest part of his holding and that every tenure holder is as far as possible allotted the plot on which exists his private source of irrigation or any other improvement, together with an area on the vicinity equal to the valuation of the plot originally held by him. In the above conspectus, the orders of Consolidation authorities must sufficiently indicate that they were alive to the requirements as contained in the section under reference. In this connection, it may be observed that expression "as far as possible" does not confer any unbridled power and the requirements embodied therein must be followed and in case compliance cannot be made, the specific reasons have to be assigned therefor. The order passed by the Deputy Director of Consolidation is a laconic one informed with no reasons at all and the orders of Consolidation Officer and Settlement Office of Consolidation also suffer from the self-same error. It is thus manifest that non-application of mind is writ large and the orders suffer from scantiness of reasons and non-application of mind to the requirements of Section 19 (1) of the Act. It has been repeatedly held that reasons provide flesh to the bare bone and it fosters confidence of the litigant public that their viewpoints have been noticed. Secondly, the authority concerned should bear in mind that if no reasons are given, the scope of Judicial review becomes nominal and the Court cannot effectively consider the legality and propriety of the impugned order unless reasons for its making are disclosed. The right of a party to know the reasons for the decision of the quasi-judicial authorities is sanctified by the principles of natural justice. In case the order is not informed with reasons, it would litter the mind of the litigant public with suspicion that the authority has approached the matter recklessly without application of mind.
5. In the above conspectus, the petition succeeds and is allowed and in consequence, the impugned order dated 20.5.2002 is quashed. The matter is relegated to the Deputy Director of Consolidation attended with the direction to decide the revision afresh in accordance with law after reckoning with the grievances of the parties as articulated and discussed in the body of this judgment. It would be appreciable if the matter is given quietus and taken to some logical conclusion within a period of four months from the date of production of a certified copy of this order.