Gram Panchayat Gobindpura, District Bhatinda and ors. vs Sub Divisional Magistrate, Bhatinda and ors.

S.D. Bajaj, J.

Vide order Annexure P. I dated August 17,1988 learned Sub Divisional Magistrate, Bhatinda, attached the land in dispute and appointed Naib Tehsildar, Nathana, as its receiver. Land in dispute is recorded in the revenue papers as jointly owned by the village proprietors. Local Committee of residents of village Gobindpura has been managing it and utilizing its income for the common benefit and welfare of the village community. Respondents 4 to 8 are lessees on the disputed land from the local committee of management aforesaid for the last 15 years.

All of a sudden Gram Panchayat, Gobindpura. gave this land to petitioners 2 to 7 on lease on January 23, 1988. Local Committee of proprietors of land in village Gobindpura, who claimed to be in possession of the land in dispute through respondents 4 to 8 as their lessees, moved the authorities on executive side and the proceedings initiated by them culminated in the order dated August 17, 1988 aforesaid. Gram Panchayat as also its lessees arrayed as petitioners 2 to 7 have filed in this Court Criminal Misc. No. 5910/M of 1988 for quashing the order aforesaid. Various grounds for quashing the order are that the impugned order is wholly without jurisdiction because the land in dispute vests in petitioner No. 1 Gram Panchayat who has in turn leased it out to petitioners 2 to 7, that the Local Committee had filed a suit for injunction against the petitioners and proforma. respondents 9 and 10, on April 28, 1998 which was dismissed as withdrawn on August 2, 1988 and that the land in suit being of Jumla Malkan Gram Panchayat is alone entitled to manage it.

I have heard Shri H. L. Sarin, Sr. Advocate, for the petitioners, Shri M. S. Sullar. Advocate, for the respondents and have carefully gone through the record

The learned counsel for the petitioners urged with reference to the observations made in Harbans Lal and another v. Hans Raj and of ors. (1980) I ILR (Punjab & Haryana) 521 that since the applicant initiating proceedings before the learned Sub Divisional, Magistrate, Bhatinda, i e. the Local Committee of proprietors of land in village Gobindpura had urged the village proprietors to be in joint possession of the land in suit through them, and allegation of its being in exclusive possession of the land in suit was wholly missing and as such finding on this point by the learned Sub Divisional Magistrate was not called for and, therefore, the proceedings under section 145 of the Criminal Procedure Code were wholly illegal and misconceived. While advancing this argument learned counsel for the petitioners appears to have lost sight of the fact that it is only the ownership of the land in suit which is alleged to be of the village proprietors while its management is being done by respondent No. 3, the Local Committee and it is through the Local Committee aforesaid that respondent 4 to 8 are cultivating the land as lessees for the last over 15 years.

As held in Kala Singh v. Commissioner, Hissar Division and others, 1984(1) All India Land Laws Reports 433 and Mange Ram and others v. The Collector, Sonepat and others, 1986 R.R.R. 637 : 1986 Punjab Law Journal 406 , the land in dispute vests in the proprietary body and not in the Panchayat. Petitioner No. 1 or its lessees in petitioners 2 to 7 have thus no right to get the impugned order quashed.

Again it has been held in Smt. Soma alias Sahib Kaur v. Gurnam Singh and another, 1984(2) Recent Criminal Reports 251 :

"The question whether there was sufficient material for the trial court to come to the conclusion that there was danger of breach of peace, is not for the revisional Court to determine. It is for the Magistrate concerned to come to the conclusion on the material before him whether such a dispute exists. However scanty the material might be, the trial Court is the proper forum for the purpose of determining this fact. I am accordingly of the opinion that this question should not have been allowed to be agitated by the learned Additional Sessions Judge. Moreover, this point now stands concluded by a Supreme Court decision in R.H. Bhutani v. Miss Mani J. Desai and others, 1968 CAR (SC) 233 wherein it has been observed in the following terms :

"The satisfaction under Subsection (1) is of the Magistrate. The question whether on the materials before him he should initiate proceedings, or not is, therefore, in his discretion which, no doubt, has to be exercised in accordance with the well recognised rules of law in that behalf. No hard and fast rule can, therefore, be laid down as to the sufficiency of material for his satisfaction. The language of the subsection is clear and unambiguous that he can arrive at his satisfaction both from the police report or from other information which must include an application by the party dispossessed. The High Court in the exercise of its revisional jurisdiction, would not go into the question of material which has satisfied the Magistrate.

The question is whether the preliminary order passed by the Magistrate was in breach of section 145(1), that is, in the absence of either of the two conditions precedent. One of the grounds on which the High Court interfered was that the Magistrate failed to record in his preliminary order the reasons for his satisfaction. The section, no doubt, requires him to record reasons. The Magistrate has expressed his satisfaction on the basis of the facts set out in the application before him and after he has examined the appellant on oath. That means that those facts were reasons leading to his satisfaction."

Applying the aforesaid principle, the order of the learned SubDivisional Executive Magistrate, Thanesar, dated February 8, 1983 in the present case and the proceedings consequent thereto, are unassailable.

For the reasons given above Criminal Miscellaneous is rendered to be wholly without merit and is consequently dismissed.