Joginder Singh and others vs Chuhra and another

S.S. Sodhi, J.

The controversy in appeal here is with regard to the claim of the plaintiff for possession as tenant of the surplus land allotted to him.

The land in suit was owned by Mansha Singh, a big landowner. Being in excess of his permissible area, it was declared surplus under the Punjab Security of Land Tenures Act. On April 15, 1964, this land was allotted to the plaintiff Chuhra. He claims that possession thereof was delivered to him on November 19, 1965. Later, on October 28, 1968, Mansha Singh the landowner sold this land to Joginder Singh and others, who, according to the plaintiff Chuhra, forcibly dispossessed him from the land in June 1970. The present suit having been filed on December 18, 1972, must clearly be held to be barred by limitation.

It will be seen that the case here is founded upon the plea of wrongful dispossession of a tenant from the land held by him. It is now wellsettled, as held by the Full Bench in Bhag Singh v. Jawahar Singh, AIR 1965 Punjab 321, that a tenant, who has been wrongfully dispossessed of his tenancy, by his landlord and has failed to file a suit for recovery of possession, as required under Section 77 (3) (g) of the Punjab Tenancy Act, 1887, within a period of one year, loses his remedy altogether and is debarred from bringing a suit for possession under the general Law of Limitation in a civil Court. Such being the law, there can be no escape from the conclusion that the plaintiff Chuhra was not entitled to the relief claimed. This being so, the decree of the lower appellate Court, allowing the plaintiff''s suit for possession, to the extent of 11 kanals and 14 marlas of land is hereby set side.

In the result, the appeal filed by Joginder Singh and others is hereby accepted while that of the plaintiff Chuhra is hereby dismissed. In the circumstances, however, there will be no order as to costs.