Himachal Pradesh High Court
Decided On: 11.03.2025 vs Financial Commissioner (Appeals) And ... on 11 March, 2025
Author: Ajay Mohan Goel
Bench: Ajay Mohan Goel
2025:HHC:5601
IN THE HIGH COURT OF HIMACHAL PRADESH, SHIMLA
CWP No. 2690 of 2015
Decided on: 11.03.2025
Sukhdev Singh Parmar ... Petitioner
Versus
Financial Commissioner (Appeals) and others ... Respondents
Coram
Hon'ble Mr. Justice Ajay Mohan Goel, Judge.
Whether approved for reporting?1 Yes
_____________________________________________________
For the petitioner : Mr. Bhuvnesh Sharma, Senior
Advocate with Mr. Shekhar Badola,
Advocate.
For the respondents : Mr. Pushpender Jaswal, Addl. AG for
respondent No. 1.
: Mr. Vikas Rathore, Advocate for
respondent No. 2.
: Mr. Nitin Thakur and Rajat Awasthy,
Advocates for respondent No. 3.
: Mr. Dushyant Dadwal, Advocate for
respondent No. 4.
Ajay Mohan Goel, Judge (Oral)
By way of this writ petition, the petitioner has prayed for the following substantive reliefs:-
"(i) That the impugned order dated 25.03.2014 passed by the Learned Financial Commissioner (Appeal) Himachal Pradesh respondent No. 1 in Revision Petition No. 148/2010, whereby the order dated 09.04.2010 passed by the 1 Whether reporters of the local papers may be allowed to see the judgment?2
2025:HHC:5601 Divisional Commissioner Kangra at Dharamshala in Revision Petition No. 235/2009, order dated 22.12.2008 passed in Case No. 15/2007 by the Learned Sub-division Collector Palampur and order dated 21.03.2007 passed by the Learned AC First Grade Palampur passed in case No. 23/2007 at Annexure P-2 to Annexure P-5 respectively may kindly be quashed and set aside and the suit land may kindly be ordered to be repartitioned strictly in accordance with the mode of partition prepared, in the interest of justice."
2. The petitioner herein is aggrieved by the orders that have been passed by the Quasi-Judicial Authorities against the final partition which was assailed by the petitioner.
3. Brief facts necessary for the adjudication of this writ petition are that an application was moved before Assistant Collector 1st Grade, Palampur, District Kangra, H.P. by one Smt. Sirmistha Devi for the partition of the joint land, comprised in Khata Khatauni No. 331/782, Khasra No. 1912, measuring 0-23-56 Hects, situated at Mohal Ghuggar, Tehsil Palampur, District Kangra, H.P. The application was forwarded to Assistant Collector 2nd Grade, Palampur, for proposing the mode of partition. Mode of partition was proposed after hearing the parties on 27.12.2006. Thereafter the same was submitted to the Assistant Collector 1st Grade, Palampur 3 2025:HHC:5601 and said Authority confirmed the mode of partition on 20.01.2007 and forwarded the papers to the Field Kanungo for spot partition. After receipt of papers from field agency, Assistant Collector 1st Grade, Palampur, sanctioned the final partition in the presence of the parties, including the present petitioner, vide order dated 21.03.2007.
4. Feeling aggrieved, an appeal was filed by the present petitioner primarily on the ground that though on papers, he was allotted land measuring 0-07-28 hectares by reflecting the same as Khasra No. 1912/2 but the Tatima prepared and tagged with the file did not contain land more than 0-07-04 hectares. The appeal was dismissed by the Collector, Sub Division, Palampur, District Kangra, in terms of Annexure P-3, dated 22.12.2008. While dismissing the appeal, learned Collector assigned the following reasons:-
"The grounds offered for invoking the appellate jurisdiction of this court are that Ld A.C Ist Grade has passed the impugned order conforming the partition of land which is against law and facts on the file as the revenue officer below has failed to verify the correctness of the tatimas prepared by the field staff while passing the impugned order the appellant on papers has been allotted land measuring 0-07-28 Hects by showing the same as Khasra No. 1912/2, but the Tatima prepared at the spot and tagged with the file does not contain land more than 0-07-04 Hects The Field Staff while-preparing the tatimas 4 2025:HHC:5601 of the parties have not acted honestly as is evident from the actual measurement of the land allotted to the respective parties.
On receipt of the file, the respondents were summoned in the Court to defend the case, respondents did not appear in the Court and ex-parte proceedings were initiated against them.
I have heard the Ld Counsel for the appellant and have gone through the record place on file as well Lower Court case file. The major objection taken by the appellant in the current appeal is that the Ld A.C. Ist Grade, Palampur passed impugned order without verifying the correctness of the tatimas prepared at the spot. It is the contention of the appellant that he has been allotted a total of 0-07-28 Hects of land vide Khasra No. 1912/2 which as per the tatima tagged with the case file contains not more than 0- 07-04 Hects of land. However the bare perusal the tatima and field book attached with lower Court case file reveals that while calculating the area of khasra No. 1912/2 the lower revenue staff has carried out the calculation:-
Total area 47(16+15)/2-728.
Therefore, making the area of said khasra No. as 0-07-28 Hects. Afore mentioned calculation has been challenged by the appellant as in correct and it was argued by the Ld Counsel for the appellant that none of the sides of the said khasra No. measured 47 or 16 or 15. Therefore, the calculation of area is flawed. However bare perusal of the tatima and the field book reveals that the lower field staff has divided the said khasra No. into two triangular shapes and for the sake of brevity, their area has been calculated as :-
Area = Base x (perpendicular 1+perpendicular 2) 5 2025:HHC:5601 2 Where the perpendiculars fall from both the angles of the triangle up on the base. Even otherwise if the said area was to be calculated as sum of area of two triangles. It would have been calculated as :-
Area Area of triangle one + Area of triangle two Area =base x perpendicular one + base x perpendicular two 2 2 Area = 47x 16 + 47x15 = 47 x (16+15) = 728.
2 2 2 As is clear from the above mentioned calculation, the calculation of the area for the said Khasra No. has been done properly and hence the contention of the appellant that his share has been wrongfully cut down, does not stand.
In view of the observations mentioned supra the contentions of the appellant that the field staff have not acted honestly while preparing tatima and that the lower court has failed to verify the correctness of the tatimas prepared by the field staff do not hold ground."
5. Feeling aggrieved by the order passed by the Sub Divisional Collector, the petitioner preferred a revision before the Divisional Commissioner, Kangra Division at Dharamshala, which was dismissed on 09.04.2010 and the subsequent revision preferred by him against the order passed by the Divisional Commissioner before the Financial Commissioner (Appeals) also met the same fate and was dismissed vide order dated 25.03.2014.
6. Feeling aggrieved, the petitioner filed this writ petition 6 2025:HHC:5601 praying for the reliefs already quoted hereinabove.
7. Learned Senior Counsel appearing for the petitioner vehemently argued that the orders passed by the Authorities below are per se bad and not sustainable in law as none of the Authorities appreciated the fact that it was evident from the record itself that the land actually allotted to the petitioner on ground was much less than what is reflected in the papers. He thus submitted that as this glaring mistake was not rightly appreciated either by the Collector or the revisional Authorities, the writ petition be allowed and the impugned orders be set aside.
8. On the other hand, learned Counsel for the respondents submitted that the petitioner has failed before the three authorities. They submitted that the contention of the petitioner that he was allotted less land than actually on the ground is totally incorrect as he was allotted land in terms of the final partition, which is also evident from the order passed by the learned Collector, who took the pain of calculating the land allotted to the petitioner, as is evident from the order passed by him and the findings returned in whose order are explicit that there was no merit in the contention of the petitioner that he was allotted less land. Learned Counsel further submitted that even otherwise in exercise of its judicial review under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, this Court is not to act as an 7 2025:HHC:5601 Appellate Authority and only has to go into the procedural irregularities, if any and as no procedural irregularities have been pointed out by the petitioner in the course of hearing of the appeal or the revision petitions, therefore also, the orders under challenge call for no interference.
9. Having heard learned Senior Counsel appearing for the petitioner as well as learned Counsel for the private respondents as also learned Additional Advocate General and having perused the orders passed by the Authorities which are under challenge as well as other documents appended with the petition, this Court is of the considered view that there is no occasion for this Court to interfere with the orders in issue. As I have already mentioned hereinabove, the grievance of the petitioner primarily was that the land allotted to him was less than that actually is reflected in the final partition. A perusal of the order passed by the learned Collector demonstrates that this plea of the petitioner was considered at length by the Collector. He undertook the pain of calculating the land that was allotted to the petitioner and in terms of the findings returned by him, the land which was allotted to the petitioner was strictly in consonance with the final partition, i.e. 0-07-28 hectares. These findings of his have been affirmed by learned Divisional Commissioner as well as learned Financial Commissioner (Appeals). 8
2025:HHC:5601 In fact, a perusal of the orders passed by the Revisional authorities demonstrate that when the partition was confirmed before the Assistant Collector 1st Grade on 21.03.2007, the petitioner himself was present and he admitted the partition as carried out on the spot by submitting that it was acceptable to him. His statement to this effect was recorded by the Field Kanungo on 20.03.2007 at the time of partition which was available on record. In the light of these developments, as has been held by learned Financial Commissioner also, the contention of the petitioner that the land actually allotted to him was less than what was reflected in the documents is without any merit because if that was so, then it is not understood as to why the petitioner, at the time of confirmation of the partition, made a statement at the spot that the partition was acceptable to him.
10. Moreover, in the exercise of its writ jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, this Court is not to act as an Appellate Authority and has to exercise its power of judicial review and scope of interference therein is narrow and the High Court interferes with the orders passed by the quasi-judicial authorities only if they shock the judicial conscious of the Court or if there is glaring irregularity manifest therein. A perusal of the orders passed by the Collector and the Revisional authorities, does not demonstrate that there is either any glaring error manifest therein or 9 2025:HHC:5601 the Authorities have not followed the due procedure in the course of the adjudication of the appeal or the revision petitions or the findings are contrary to the record.
Therefore, in light of above observations as this Court does not find any merit in the present petition, the same is accordingly dismissed. Pending miscellaneous application(s), if any, also stand disposed of accordingly.
(Ajay Mohan Goel) Judge March 11, 2025 (narender)