Punjab-Haryana High Court
Bishna Ram vs State Of Haryana And Others on 27 November, 2012
Author: Ranjit Singh
Bench: Ranjit Singh
CIVIL WRIT PETITION NO.18906 OF 2008 :{ 1 }:
IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH
DATE OF DECISION: NOVEMBER 27, 2012
Bishna Ram
.....Petitioner
VERSUS
State of Haryana and others
....Respondents
CORAM:- HON'BLE MR.JUSTICE RANJIT SINGH
1. Whether Reporters of local papers may be allowed to see the judgement?
2. To be referred to the Reporters or not?
3. Whether the judgment should be reported in the Digest?
Present: Mr. K. L. Suneja, Advocate,
for the petitioner.
Mr. Sunil Nehra, Sr.DAG, Haryana,
for the State.
Mr. Pankaj Jain, Advocate,
for respondent Nos.5 to 7.
*****
RANJIT SINGH, J.
The petitioner has challenged the order dated 4.9.2008 (Annexure P-7) passed by the Financial Commissioner, where the petitioner-tenant has been ordered to be ejected from the land in his possession as tenant.
Brij Raj Saran was the owner of the land measuring 16 kanals. Sh.Mangu was tenant over the said land for number of years and died in the year 1979. The petitioner inherited the said tenancy. On 9.3.1981, Brij Raj Saran also died and the land was inherited by CIVIL WRIT PETITION NO.18906 OF 2008 :{ 2 }:
his wife, Smt.Ganga Aggarwal. She also died on 10.3.1981 and her share devolved upon Miss Shifali and Parnav Saran, grand daughter and grand son of the deceased. The petitioner, however, continued to remain as a tenant and states to have paid batai till rabbi 2008. Despite this, the petitioner has been ordered to be ejected for non- payment of batai for crop 1983 to rabbi 1986. The petition was filed and the matter went up to Financial Commissioner, who dismissed the ejectment petition on 3.11.1995.
The private respondents herein had again filed an application for ejectment of the petitioner on the ground of non- payment of rent on 29.12.1985. The petitioner filed reply, stating that entire rent has been paid and that the land had been acquired by the State and, thus, the petition by the private respondents was not maintainable. Assistant Collector IInd Grade dismissed the ejectment petition on 29.3.2001. Collector, Jagadhri, also dismissed the appeal on 9.9.2002. The Commissioner, Ambala, also upheld both the orders and dismissed the revision on 24.5.2006. In fact, the land was acquired by the State of Haryana on 16.7.2007. Still, the Financial Commissioner has allowed the revision on 4.9.2008, directing that the petitioner be ejected from the land in question. The petitioner accordingly has filed the present petition.
Written statement is filed by respondent Nos.5 to 7. By way of preliminary submissions, it is stated that the said respondents are owners of land and the petitioner was a tenant. It is stated that when the petitioner-tenant failed to pay the rent due from kharif 1983 to rabbi 1985, the respondents had filed an application under Section CIVIL WRIT PETITION NO.18906 OF 2008 :{ 3 }:
14-A (ii) of the Punjab Security of Land Tenures Act, 1953 (for short, "the Act") as applicable to the State of Haryana read with Rule 22 (2) of the Punjab Security of Land Tenure Rules, 1956. This application was filed on Form M before the Assistant Collector on 29.12.1985. Statutory notice was served on Form N on 8.1.1986. The petitioner was, thus, called upon to pay the rent amounting to 1515.48 P or if the same stood already paid, then to submit the proof thereof. It is pursuant to these proceedings that the impugned order is passed. Subsequently, the respondents had also filed an application under Section 14-A (i) of the Act on Form L for ejectment of the petitioner for non-payment of rent regularly. The same, however, was dismissed. It is accordingly pleaded that the Financial Commissioner is fully justified in passing the impugned order. In support of the submissions, reference is made to number of judgements, which are Gurmej Singh and others Vs. The Financial Commissioner, Revenue, Punjab, Chandigarh and others, 1980 P.L.J. 603, Kapur Chand Vs. Financial Commissioner, Punjab & Others, 1965 P.L.J. 91, Mrs.Raj Kanta Vs. The Financial Commissioner, Punjab and another, 1980 P.L.J. 346 and Surja Vs. The State of Haryana and others, 1980 P.L.J. 177.
I have considered the rival submissions made before me. During the course of arguments, it is conceded before me that the land in question has been acquired by the State. Counsel for the private respondents, however, submits that it would not make any difference as the application was filed prior to the acquisition of the land and now the petitioner, being tenant, would not be entitled to CIVIL WRIT PETITION NO.18906 OF 2008 :{ 4 }:
receive compensation as he has been ejected from the land in question.
Concededly, the petitioner and his predecessors had been the tenant over this land for number of years. The Assistant Collector IInd Grade in his order dated 29.3.2001 has noticed that Sh.Naresh Saran admitted the receipt for rabbi 1984 to be correct and the receipt for rest of batai of the crops issued by Sugan Chand after receiving the batai from the private respondents, which Naresh Saran himself admits. The finding accordingly is that the batai for the crops in question has been paid by the petitioner and the respondents have failed to prove that they have not received the batai. Even the Collector found it as a matter of fact that the private respondents failed to prove that they had not received the batai for crop in dispute and finding no substance in the arguments, dismissed the appeal filed by the private respondents. The issue was considered by the Commissioner threadbare on the basis of the arguments, which are now raised. The Commissioner has also relied upon the statement made by Naresh Saran, that in his life time, their father Sugan Chand, he was the Karinda and used to receive batai. No notice was given to the tenants that Sugan Chand is not the Karinda. Reference is made to the earlier order passed by the Financial Commissioner, whereby the tenant had been paying batai during the life time of father of the petitioner, Brij Raj Saran and after his death, no notice about the change of ownership was given. Till the sanction of mutation, the respondent-tenants had been paying batai to Sugan Chand and thereafter the petitioner had himself CIVIL WRIT PETITION NO.18906 OF 2008 :{ 5 }:
received the batai. The Commissioner, thus, dismissed the revision and upheld the order passed by the authorities concerned. Three revenue authorities had returned a finding of fact that batai was paid to the Karinda. After making reference to the cross-examination of Sugan Chand, it is observed that he was not Karinda of Naresh Saran but the Financial Commissioner has ignored this fact that he claimed to be Karinda of Rai Bahadur, Brij Raj Saran and has stated that no batai was outstanding till rabbi 1983. He otherwise admitted the receipts having been issued by him, accepting the batai in writing and orally. This being the position, the factual aspect would also not support the cause of the private respondents.
Reliance by the counsel for the private respondents on the judgements in this factual background would not help him much. Even otherwise, this Court has considered the judgement in the case of Gurmej Singh (supra) and the provisions of Section 14-A (ii) of the Act in Civil Writ Petition No.20067 of 2010 (Pritam Singh through his L.Rs Vs. Financial Commissioner, Animal Husbandry, Punjab, Chandigarh and others), decided on 4.10.2012 and has observed as under:-
"Gurmej Singh (supra) was a case which was filed under Punjab Security of Land Tenures Act under Section 14-A(ii). The scope of the Section and tenant not paying rent admitted by him was being considered in this case, where it was held that the jurisdiction of the authority to grant further time to tenant would not be there. Section 14 basically makes a provision for summary procedure.
CIVIL WRIT PETITION NO.18906 OF 2008 :{ 6 }:
Thus, in this case, the court was not considering the proviso under Section 7 of the Pepsu Act, which has made a specific provision for granting time to the tenant where he has failed to pay the rent within a period of six months after it falls due. As per this proviso, no tenant shall be ejected under this clause unless he has been afforded an opportunity to pay the arrears of rent within a further period of six months from the date of decree or the order directing the ejectment and he had failed to pay such arrears during this period. The issue in this case, thus, would be to see whether this six months period is to be provided by the court or shall be deemed to have been so provided even if no such direction or even if no such permission is granted by the court ordering ejectment."
This Court has also considered the provisions of Section 14-A (i) and (ii) of the Act while deciding Civil Writ Petition No.17792 of 2011 (Sanjiv Kumar Vs. Financial Commissioner, Revenue, Haryana, Chandigarh and others), decided on 6.11.2012. The relevant observations are as under:-
"Reference is made to the provisions provided in the Punjab Security of Land Tenures Act, 1953 (Punjab Act) for ejectment of a tenant for non-payment of rent and for recovery of arrears of rent. Section 14-A (i) provides that a land owner desiring to eject a tenant, shall apply in writing to Assistant Collector, who shall proceed CIVIL WRIT PETITION NO.18906 OF 2008 :{ 7 }:
thereafter as per the procedure under Sub-section (2) of Section 10 of the Punjab Act. The application under Section 14-A(i) has to be filed in Form-L. This is so provided by Rule 22 of Punjab Security of Land Tenures Rules, 1956. It is stated that prior to 1991, the Assistant Collector was not required to make any assessment of rent and the land owner had simply to plead that tenant had failed to pay the rent without any sufficient cause. The Legislature in its wisdom and in order to save the tenants from illegal ejectment by unscrupulous and crafty landowners due to non-payment of rent added Proviso to Section 14-A(i) to the effect that if the tenant makes the payment of arrears of rent and interest as calculated within 15 days from the first hearing, then he would not be ejected. This Proviso was added to meet the situation so that the tenants could be protected. The proviso reads as under:-
"Provided that if the tenant makes payment of arrears of rent and interest, to be calculated by the Assistant Collector 1st Grade, at eight percentum per annum on such arrears together with such costs of the application, if any, as may be allowed by the Assistant Collector 1st, either on the day of first hearing or within fifteen days from the date of such hearing, he shall not be ejected."
The application for recovery of rent, according to the respondents, had to be filed under Section 14-A(ii) of the CIVIL WRIT PETITION NO.18906 OF 2008 :{ 8 }:
Punjab Law and was required to be filed in Form-M. The copy of the Form-M is also placed on record.
In this context, it is pleaded that Assistant Collector passed the order treating this case to be of recovery of rent and made assessment of the rent requiring the respondents to pay within 15 days. According to the respondents, the Assistant Collector failed to notice that the ejectment of the tenant from the area declared surplus which had vested in the State Government could not be ordered and the land owners were only entitled to recover the rent if due by filing an application in Form-M under Section 14-A(ii) of the Punjab Act or by filing a regular suit under Section 77(3)(n) of the Punjab Tenancy Act, 1887. Accordingly, the orders passed by the Collector and that of the Commissioner have been held justified."
In this case also, the land has been acquired and so the ejectment of the petitioner could not have been ordered and only recovery of rent could have been so ordered as is the purview of Section 14(ii) of the Act.
Accordingly, the order passed by the Financial Commissioner can neither be sustained in facts nor in law and the same is accordingly set-aside. The writ petition is accordingly allowed. The parties are left to bear their respective costs.
November 27, 2012 (RANJIT SINGH ) khurmi JUDGE