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4. Prior to the aforesaid order and also after the aforesaid order was passed, in a series of judgments, a view has been taken by the Single Benches and Division Benches of this Court that mutation on the basis of Will cannot take place by Revenue Authorities in any manner and that without the Will being proved before the Civil Court either in a civil suit or in probate/letter of administration proceedings, the propounder of the Will cannot maintain proceedings for mutation on agricultural land on the basis of Will. In this line of judgments, view has been taken by a Single Benches of this Court in WP No.11871/2021 (Rajkumar Sharma and others Vs. Manjesh Kumar), MP No.23/2021 (Kusum Bai Kori Vs. Ummedi Bai), MP No.5345/2019 (Avnish Kumar Vs. Satyaprakash), WP No.2578/2022 (Geeta Paliwal Vs. Sitaram) and by the Division Benches of this Court in WP No.16413/2024 (Bhagone @ Bhagwan Singh Patel (deceased) Through LRs and others Vs. State of M.P. and others), WA No.1466/2024 (Arun Kumar Sharma Vs. State of M.P.) and in the case of Harprasad Bairagi Vs. Radheshyam reported in 2022(1) MPLJ 414. In all the aforesaid judgments, it has been held that the Revenue Authorities cannot carry out mutation on the basis of Will and for a Will to constitute basis for mutation in revenue records, the parties propounding the Will and claiming rights on the basis of Will on the lands have to get the Will proved before the Civil Court by filing a civil suit or probate/letter of administration proceedings and only thereafter mutation can be carried out on the basis of Will. Further it has been held that in case where dispute is there as to validity or genuineness of the Will, then the Revenue Authorities deciding the matter of mutation on the basis of Will have no jurisdiction to decide the genuineness or validity of the Will by taking evidence as to validity of the Will. The same is purely in the province of Civil Court.

7. The counsel for the respective parties have argued their respective cases at length. The arguments to uphold that mutation can be made on the basis of Will without the Will being previously proved before the Civil Court were led by Shri Naman Nagrath, Senior Advocate and supplemented by Shri Vipin Yadav, Advocate and Shri D.K. Tripathi, Advocate, etc. The learned counsel supporting the view to carry out mutation on the basis of Will have argued at length that if the Scheme of Section 109 & Section 110 of MPLRC is seen, it will be clear that acquisition of Rights has to be reported by any person lawfully acquiring any right or interest in the land within 6 months of such acquisition of rights and that as per Section 109 (3) any person whose rights, interests or liabilities are required to be or have been entered in any record or register under this Chapter, shall be bound on the requisition in writing of any Revenue Officer, to furnish or produce for his inspection, all such information or documents needed for the correct compilation or revision thereof. And also that under Section 109 (4), a person neglecting to furnish such information is liable to penalty and further that after receiving such information, the concerned Officer in terms of Section 109 (5) shall deal with the information received after such prescribed period in accordance with Section 110. It is further argued that as per Section 110 (4), there is a provision that the Tahsildar shall pass orders relating to mutation within thirty days of registration of case, in case of undisputed matter, and within five months, in case of disputed matters and thereafter make necessary entry in the revenue and land records/khasras. It is argued that under Section 110, the Tahsildar shall only record a 'right' and shall not record a 'title'. Thus, while it may be true that Tahsildar may not be having competence to deal with title, yet the Tahsildar is having competence to record a 'right' which is for fiscal purpose only and for no other purpose. Thus, the contention of the petitioners that mutation will create a title in the land is utterly misplaced and not made out from the scheme of MPLRC and by the law settled so far.

13. Per contra, the arguments for the other side were led by Shri R.K. Sanghi, Senior Advocate and by Smt. Rashmi Pathak, Advocate. They argued vehemently that on the basis of Will no mutation can be carried out without the Will being subjected to proof before the Civil Court. It was argued that a person should necessarily approach the Civil Court before seeking mutation on the basis of Will and the judgment of the Supreme Court in Jitendra Singh (supra) though does not take into consideration the Mutation Rules of 2018, but is still binding. It was argued that there are many cases in the State whereby on the basis of forged and fraudulent Wills, mutations have been carried out without even noticing the actual legal representatives of deceased landowner/Bhumiswami and thereafter such persons after getting mutation done in summary proceedings for mutation under Section 109/110 MPLRC then even sale the land or mortgage the land which puts the actual legal heirs to great jeopardy. It is argued that the procedure before the Revenue Authority i.e. Tahsildar for mutation is summary procedure and if the mutation Rules 2018 are interpreted in the manner as suggested by the other side, then merely on the basis of photocopy of a Will or self attested copy of a Will any person can get mutation on the land of any deceased Bhumiswami without even the original being produced before the Revenue Court. Even otherwise, Revenue Court is not well equipped nor legally trained to take evidence in the matter of proof of a document and therefore, the disputed Wills cannot be subjected to adjudication before the Revenue Court. It is argued that as per Section 63 of Indian Succession Act, a Will is necessarily required to be attested by two or more witnesses and as per Section 68 of Indian Evidence Act (now section 67 of Bhartiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023), a document which is required to be attested cannot be used as evidence until one attesting witness atleast has been called for the purpose of proving its execution. Thus, it is argued that Will cannot be proved even on the admission of the parties and it is required to be proved by evidence of atleast one attesting witness. Therefore, the Tahsildar cannot carry out mutation on the basis of Will without it being proved before the Civil Court because without the Will being ratified in evidence by one atleast attesting witness, it cannot be used as evidence. Therefore, the view taken by various Single Benches and Division Benches of this Court that no mutation on the basis of Will can be carried out without the Will being subjected to proof before the Civil Court is correct and deserves to be upheld. It is further contended that suit is not required to be instituted by the person who is doubting the genuineness of the Will, rather the correct view is that suit is required to be instituted by the propounder of a Will and get the Will proved before the Civil Court and only then Will will be a document of mutation in terms of Mutation Rules of 2018 and not before that. Thus, it is contended that the question be answered by this Court in that manner. It is further argued that though there are series of judgments of this Court and of the Hon'ble Supreme Court that mutation entries are only for fiscal purpose, but the fact remains that under the Scheme of MPLRC, a record of right carries with it not only the fiscal duty to pay land revenue but also a number of rights which almost amount to proprietory rights and it cannot be said that mutation is only for fiscal purpose in State of Madhya Pradesh looking to the scheme of MPLRC. Thus, it is contended that the legal question referred to this Full Bench be answered negating mutation applications on the basis of Will without the Will being subjected to rigors of it being proved before the Civil Court.

44. Section 110(4) of M.P.L.R.C. also makes it mandatory that the Tahsildar has to afford reasonable opportunity of being heard to the persons interested. This, in the case of will would mean that the Tahsildar would be under obligation to enquire about the legal heirs of the person who has executed the will and to hear them. No mutation on the basis of will would be valid without the Tahsildar inquiring about the legal heirs of the person who has executed the will and giving them opportunity of being heard. In case of any legal heir raising any dispute or any other person raising any dispute as to the validity or competency of will or title of the testator, then the Tahsildar would not have any authority to carry out mutation on the basis of will. The time limit of five months given in case of disputed matters cannot be read to the exclusion of Section 111 of M.P.L.R.C. and it can only be construed to be a time limit for the Tahsildar to arrive at a conclusion whether any dispute exists in the matter and giving opportunity to parties to approach the Civil Court. If there is a dispute in the matter, then the Tahsildar cannot assume the jurisdiction of Civil Court which has not been contemplated under Section 111 of M.P.L.R.C. and decide disputed cases. Therefore, we hold that in all disputed cases, the Tahsildar would have no right to carry out mutation on the basis of will and mutation on basis of will in disputed cases would have to wait till the dispute is adjudicated by the Civil Court, in the manner being set out in detail infra.