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This Writ Petition is filed, aggrieved by the common order dated 21.05.2026 in Appeal Nos.F2/2151/2025 and F2/2156/2025 under Sections 90 and 91 of the A.P. (Telangana Area) Tenancy and Agricultural Lands Act, 1950, whereby the 2nd Respondent allowed the Appeals filed by the 5th Respondent - M/s Leo Meridian Infrastructure Projects and Hotels Limited, set aside the order dated 27.01.2017 passed by the 4th Respondent - Tahsildar, Shamirpet Mandal, in Case No.B/2198/2016 under Section 32(1) read with Section 98 of the Act, set aside the order dated 24.09.2019 passed by the 3rd Respondent - Revenue Divisional Officer, Keesara Division, in Proceedings No.L/587/2016 under Section 38-E of the Act, and directed cancellation of the consequential mutation entries, e-Pattadar Pass Books and Title Deeds in respect of the land admeasuring Acs. 10-00 guntas in Survey No.430 situated at Bommaraspet Village, Shamirpet Mandal, Medchal-Malkajgiri District.
Petitioners claim to be the agriculturists and residents of Babaguda Village, Shamirpet Mandal, Medchal-Malkajgiri District, being the legal heirs and successors of Late Kondapuram @ Dasari Chandraiah @Chandra Reddy and Late Nomula Laxmaiah @Laxma Reddy, who stood recognized as Protected Tenants under the provisions of the A.P. (Telangana Area) Tenancy and Agricultural Lands Act, 1950 in respect of the protected tenancy holdings situated at Bommaraspet Village, Shamirpet Mandal, Medchal-Malkajgiri District, including the subject land.
Petitioners contended, in substance, as follows.
a. The impugned common order dated 21.05.2026 arises out of common questions of fact and law relating to the same subject property and the same statutory proceedings, and the Writ Petition challenging the said common order in a single proceeding is maintainable.
b. The subject land originally formed part of the protected tenancy holdings of Late Kondapuram @Dasari Chandraiah @ Chandra Reddy and Late Nomula Laxmaiah @ Laxma Reddy, the ancestors of the Petitioners, who stood recognized as Protected Tenants under the provisions of the Act, their names having been reflected in the Protected Tenancy Registers as well as in the Khasra Pahani of 1954-55, the Chessala Pahani of 1955-58 and the year-wise Pahani Patrikas, as possessors and Protected Tenants. Upon the demise of the original Protected Tenants, Petitioners, being their legal heirs and successors, succeeded to the protected tenancy rights under Section 40 of the Act, and the 4th Respondent, after due enquiry, recognized Petitioners as such legal heirs and successors by Proceedings No.A/30/2003 dated 14.02.2003 and Proceedings No. A/122/2003 dated 01.05.2003.
c. The said succession proceedings were carried in appeal by rival parties before the Joint Collector, Ranga Reddy District in Appeal Proceedings Nos. F2/3226/2004 and F2/3227/2004, dismissed by common order dated 21.12.2004 confirming the succession rights of Petitioners and their predecessors; and Civil Revision Petitions Nos.597, 598, 599 and 600 of 2005 preferred against the said orders were dismissed as withdrawn/not pressed by order dated 28.03.2012, rendering the succession proceedings final and binding. Consequent thereto, petitioners initiated proceedings under Section 32(1) read with Section 98 of the Act before the 4th Respondent in Proceedings No.B/2198/2016 seeking restoration of possession of the subject land, and the 4th Respondent, after enquiry, allowed the said proceedings by order dated 27.01.2017 and restored possession in favour of the Petitioners through due process of law.
d. Petitioners thereafter, approached the 3rd Respondent seeking issuance of Ownership Certificate under Section 38-E of the Act in Proceedings No.L/587/2016, and the 3rd Respondent, after considering the material records, granted the Ownership Certificate by proceedings dated 24.09.2019 in respect of the subject land. Pursuant to the grant of the said Ownership Certificate, the revenue authorities mutated the names of Petitioners in the revenue records and issued Pattadar Pass Books and Title Deeds in their favour, and the statutory tenancy and ownership rights of the Petitioners attained finality and continued to subsist for several years, being further reflected in the due diligence reports and records prepared during the Corporate Insolvency Resolution Process concerning M/s Leo Meridian Infrastructure Projects and Hotels Limited, the 5th Respondent.
e. The alleged claim of the 5th Respondent over the land admeasuring Acs.14-08 guntas in Survey No.430 traces back to an alleged sale transaction said to have been executed by the original pattadar Smt. Ramaraju Laxmi Narsamma, the 7th Respondent, in favour of one Mamidipally Yadagiri Rao, purportedly regularized by the Tahsildar, Medchal under Section 50-B of the Act by proceedings dated 08.02.1972 in File No.B2/2412/1971, on the strength of which Mamidipally Yadagiri Rao and others executed Registered Sale Deed bearing Document No.4707/1985 dated 27.06.1985 in favour of Smt. Meda Shobha Reddy. Thereafter, through successive conveyances, lands were transferred in favour of Dr. V. Vidyasagar Rao and subsequently, under Registered Sale Deed Document Nos.3330/2007 and 3331/2007 dated 28.02.2007, in favour of Chanda Nagabhushanam and others and Rajesh Kapoor and others, and finally the 5th Respondent claims to have purchased the subject property under Registered Sale Deed Document Nos.2174/2010 and 2175/2010 dated 20.12.2010 through GPA holders of the said vendors.
f. The predecessors of Petitioners had questioned the very validity of the foundational Section 50-B proceedings dated 08.02.1972 as being contrary to Sections 38-D and 50-B(3) of the Act, and had preferred Appeals before the Joint Collector. Ranga Reddy District in Proceedings Nos. B4/156 to 160/1992, relating to Survey Nos. 414, 416, 417 and other connected survey numbers at Bommaraspet Village. The Joint Collector, Ranga Reddy District, by common orders dated 11.08.1997 in Proceedings Nos.B4/156 to 160/1992, held that regularization proceedings dated 08.02.1972 were contrary to Sections 38-D and 50-B(3) of the Act and set aside the said proceedings, thereby nullifying the very foundation of Mamidipally Yadagiri Rao's claim.
g. The derivative conveyances flowing from the invalidated proceedings, including the Sale Deed dated 27.06.1985 and the later conveyances claimed by the 5th Respondent, became seriously disputed and clouded, whereas Petitioners assert independent statutory rights as Protected Tenants recognized through the succession, restoration and Ownership Certificate proceedings, incapable of nullification by subsequent private conveyances flowing from invalidated proceedings. The 5th Respondent was fully aware of the tenancy, succession, restoration and Ownership Certificate proceedings much prior to filing the Appeals, having been arrayed as a respondent in Proceedings No.B/2198/2016 and Proceedings No.L/587/2016, and having filed detailed counters and contested the matter on merits therein.
h. The existence of the protected tenancy claims and the Ownership Certificates was also reflected in the Due Diligence Reports prepared during the CIRP of the 5th Respondent and in the proceedings of the Committee of Creditors before the National Company Law Tribunal, Hyderabad.
Despite such participation and existence of detailed records, the present management of the 5th Respondent filed the Appeals making self-serving averments of having no knowledge of the earlier proceedings, claiming to have come to know of the Section 38-E certificate only on 08.08.2025, to overcome an unexplained delay of several years. Petitioners raised a preliminary objection regarding limitation under Section 93 of the Act, but the 2nd Respondent, without any petition to condone delay and without recording a finding of sufficient cause, invoked Section 17 of the Limitation Act, 1963 on allegations of fraud without adjudication or proof rendering the impugned order without jurisdiction. The Appeals, filed after a delay of nearly six years without any application for condonation of delay, were barred by limitation under Section 93 of the Act and liable to have been rejected in limine
j. A mere change in management, change in Directors, or commencement of the Corporate Insolvency Resolution Process does not create a fresh cause of action nor extend the statutory period of limitation available to a company. The 2nd Respondent erred in invoking Section 17 of the Limitation Act, 1963 in the absence of any legally established fraud, mere allegations being insufficient unless specifically pleaded and strictly proved. That the 2nd Respondent recorded findings regarding suppression, collusion, interpolation and fraud without any trial, framing of issues, recording of evidence, or forensic examination, rendering such findings perverse and unsustainable.
k. The Ownership Certificate under Section 38-E had attained statutory finality and could not be annulled in collateral appellate proceedings without setting aside the foundational tenancy and succession proceedings. The impugned order is self-contradictory inasmuch as the 2nd Respondent observed that certain issues required detailed examination while simultaneously allowing the Appeals and cancelling vested rights; the only permissible course, if at all, was to remand the matter for fresh enquiry. The succession proceedings under Section 40 had already attained finality, confirmed before the Joint Collector and this Court in C.R.P. Nos.597 to 600 of 2005, and could not be indirectly reopened in collateral proceedings.
l. Once statutory ownership rights stood vested under Section 38-E along with consequential mutations, Pattadar Pass Books and title entries, the same could not have been lightly interfered with merely on suspicion or inference. The 2nd Respondent made findings regarding alleged interpolation and difference in ink, style and alignment in the Protected Tenancy Register without expert opinion or forensic examination, such findings being speculative, more so when statutory revenue records carry a presumption of correctness. The 2nd Respondent erred in entering into complicated questions of title relating to conveyances, mortgages, SARFAES and CIRP proceedings, though the scope of proceedings under the Act is limited and rival claims regarding title could only be adjudicated before a competent Civil Court.
m. The 2nd Respondent erred in relying upon alleged prior conveyances without appreciating that protected tenancy rights are statutory rights that cannot be presumed extinguished unless the requirements of the statute are strictly satisfied. Petitioners and their predecessors have consistently asserted protected tenancy rights over the subject lands for several decades and the impugned order unsettles long-standing statutory rights without proper adjudication. The allegations of fraud must be specifically pleaded and strictly proved and cannot be inferred on mere assumptions, and in the absence of a conclusive finding regarding fraud, the 2nd Respondent could not have annulled the statutory proceedings. That the impugned order has resulted in prejudice by directing cancellation of the Ownership Certificates, mutation entries, Pattadar Pass Books and title records, and if allowed to stand, would result in irreparable loss.
Respondent No.5 filed Counter Affidavit contending that Writ Petition is misconceived and is liable to be dismissed. It is further as under:
a. Petitioners have not approached this Court with clean hands, the writ petition being built upon the suppression of material and crucial facts, the most decisive being that the very protected tenants through whom the Petitioners claim, namely Kondapuram @ Dasari Chandra Reddy and Nomula Laxma Reddy, themselves joined as executants and sold the land admeasuring Ac.14-08 guntas in Survey No.430 under the Registered Sale Deed dated 27.06.1985 bearing Document No.4707/1985 in favour of Smt. Meda Shobha Reddy, and received the sale consideration. Having sold the land for value, the predecessors of Petitioners retained no tenancy or other right capable of transmission to the Petitioners, and this registered conveyance, executed by Petitioners' own ancestors, was studiously concealed throughout the writ petition, suppression of a material document being itself a species of fraud on the Court disentitling a litigant guilty of it to discretionary relief under Article 226 of the Constitution of India.
b. The writ jurisdiction is a discretionary extraordinary remedy incapable of being invoked by persons guilty of fraudulent conduct, Petitioners being guilty of committing large-scale fraud and of colluding with the erstwhile promoters displaced under the insolvency process under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016, the impugned order itself referring to and recording such fraud. And an order, certificate or mutation obtained by fraud, collusion and suppression of material facts is a nullity in the eye of law and confers no right whatsoever, fraud unravelling even the most solemn proceedings and rendering an order so obtained non est, liable to be ignored or set aside whenever and however brought to notice.
c. Petitioners suppressed and failed to file, along with the writ petition, several material documents that were filed by Respondent No.5 along with its Appeals, namely the order of the National Company Law Tribunal dated 25.02.2025 approving the Resolution Plan in C.P.(L.B.) No.43/7/HDB/2018, demonstrating that the Section 38-E order of 2019 was passed after admission of Respondent No.5 into Corporate Insolvency Resolution Process.
d. Petitioners further suppressed the Provisional and Final Protected Tenancy Register Extracts, demonstrating that Survey Nos. 414 and 430 were not included in the holding of the Petitioners' predecessors in the Provisional Register and were interpolated by hand at a later point in time. Petitioners also suppressed the Registered Sale Deed bearing Document No.4707/1985 dated 27.06.1985 executed in favour of Smt. Meda Shobha Reddy by the predecessors of the Petitioners/original protected tenants, demonstrating that the original protected tenants were themselves party to the very sale transaction through which Respondent No.5 traces its title.
e. Petitioners suppressed the two Registered Sale Deeds bearing Document Nos.2174/2010 and 2175/2010, both dated 20.12.2010, executed in favour of Respondent No.5, and other link documents claiming through Smt. Meda Shobha Reddy, demonstrating an unbroken link of registered documents in favour of Respondent No.5 and its vendors. Petitioners suppressed Section 38-E Certificate dated 19.05.1975 vide Proc. No. 196/LRE/75 in respect of Survey Nos.417/A, 421, 426 and 427, demonstrating that even the predecessors of the Petitioners claimed no tenancy rights over Survey Nos. 414 and 430.
f. Petitioners suppressed the Registered Memorandum of Deposit of Title Deeds bearing Document No.51 of 2011 dated 06.01.2011 in favour of Union Bank, demonstrating that Survey No.430 was mortgaged as a secured asset by the erstwhile promoters of Respondent No.5, and the copy of Original Application No.164 of 2015 filed by Bank of Baroda and others before the Debts Recovery Tribunal, Hyderabad, demonstrating that the collusive revival of stale claims was in connivance with the erstwhile promoter to defeat the mortgage rights of the lending banks. It is stated, Survey No.430 was never part of the protected-tenancy holding of Petitioners' predecessors, Final Protected Tenancy Register of 1975 recording the tenancy of Kondapuram Chandra Reddy only in respect of Survey Nos.417/A, 421, 426 and 427, and not Survey No.414 or Survey No.430.
g. Section 38-E Ownership Certificate dated 19.05.1975 issued vide Proc. No. 196/LRE/75 was granted to Kondapuram Chandra Reddy only over Ac.30-25 guntas in Survey Nos.417/A, 421, 426 and 427, Survey No.430 not being included therein, the said certificate having later been set aside on appeal vide order dated 27.03.1979 in Appeal No.B4/9678/75 and remanded for fresh enquiry, without bringing Survey No.430 within the protected-tenancy lands. That by the Registered Sale Deed dated 27.06.1985, Sri M. Yadagiri Rao, along with the alleged protected tenants Kondapuram Chandra Reddy and Nomula Laxma Reddy and others, sold the land admeasuring Ac.14-08 guntas in Survey No.430 to Smt. Meda Shobha Reddy.
h. In 1992, Kondapuram Chandra Reddy (PT), Medi Krishna Reddy and others challenged the 1972 orders bearing Nos.B2/2411/71 and B2/2412/71 by filing five appeals, B4/156/92 (Survey No.419), B4/157/92 (Survey No.417), B4/158/92 (Survey No.419), B4/159/92 (Survey No.416) and B4/160/92 (Survey No.414), before the Joint Collector, no challenge whatsoever having been raised against Survey No.430 even though Order No.B2/2412/71 also concerned Survey No.430. That by common order dated 11.08.1997 in Appeal No.B4/158/1992 and batch, the Joint Collector allowed the said appeals and set aside the Section 50-B certificates bearing Nos.B2/2411/71 and B2/2412/71, the said order making no mention whatsoever of Survey No.430, with the result that the sale of Survey No.430 in favour of Smt. Meda Shobha Reddy, to which the protected tenants were themselves parties, remains undisturbed.
By Proc. No.A/122/2003 dated 01.05.2003, the Mandal Revenue Officer granted succession under Section 40 of the Act to Kondapuram Chandra Reddy and Nomula Laxma Reddy over various survey numbers, the succession being limited, as regards Survey Nos.416, 417, 418 and 430, to an aggregate extent of only Ac.5-00 guntas across the four survey numbers, a Section 40 succession order neither creating nor enlarging tenancy. Smt. Meda Shobha Reddy sold Ac.14-08 guntas in Survey No.430 to Sri V. Dayasagar Rao by registered sale deed dated 30.08.2003, who in turn sold Ac.0-03 guntas out of Survey No.430 to Sri B. Jagannadha Rao by registered sale deed dated 25.07.2006. That on 28.02.2007, V. Dayasagar Rao and B. Jagannadha Rao sold Ac.7-04 guntas in Survey No.430 to Chanda Nagabhushanam and others, and, on the same day, V. Dayasagar Rao sold the remaining Ac.7-04 guntas in Survey No.430 to Rajesh Kapoor and others, both by registered sale deeds bearing Document Nos.3330/2007 and 3331/2007.
j. It is stated, Chanda Nagabhushanam and others and Rajesh Kapoor and others thereafter, executed registered Agreements of Sale-cum-GPA dated 17.08.2007 and 19.09.2007 respectively in favour of M/s MIM Medica Private Limited, which, acting on the said Powers of Attorney, sold the entire Acs.14-08 guntas in Survey No.430 to Respondent No.5 by two registered sale deeds dated 20.12.2010 bearing Document Nos.2174/2010 and 2175/2010, whereafter Respondent No.5 undertook construction of buildings and a golf course on the property. On 06.01.2011, Respondent No.5 created a registered mortgage over the subject property in favour of Union Bank of India by a Registered Memorandum of Deposit of Title Deeds bearing Document No.51 of 2011, and in the year 2015, Bank of Baroda and consortium initiated Original Application No.164 of 2015 before the Debts Recovery Tribunal, Hyderabad, for recovery of dues under the SARFAESI Act and the RDDBFI Act.
k. In 2016, thirteen years after the succession order, the legal representatives of Kondapuram Chandra Reddy and Nomula Laxma Reddy filed applications before the Revenue Divisional Officer for Section 38-E certificates, registered as Case No.L/588/2016 for Survey No.414 and Case No. L/587/2016 for Survey No.430, in collusion with the erstwhile management, only to defeat the interest of the banks which had initiated recovery and SARFAESI proceedings against the Company.
l. By order dated 27.01.2017 in Case No.B/2198/2016, the Tahsildar, Shamirpet Mandal, ordered restoration of possession of Survey No.430 to the legal representatives of the protected tenants, without verification of the foundational tenancy records or possession, which order the erstwhile management deliberately did not appeal. The paper panchanama/possession-delivery proceedings dated 29.11.2017 recorded handover of the land, but were never acted upon, Respondent No.5 having continued in physical possession throughout, as evidenced by satellite imagery filed on record. On 09.04.2019, the National Company Law Tribunal admitted Respondent No.5 into Corporate Insolvency Resolution Process in C.P.(I.B.) No.43/7/HDB/2018 and appointed an Interim Resolution Professional, the Board of Directors being removed and a moratorium under Section 14 of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016 commencing thereupon; and on 29.06.2019, formal written arguments were filed by the erstwhile management in Case No.L/587/2016 without disclosing the pendency of CIRP, in violation of the said moratorium.
m. On 24.09.2019, the Revenue Divisional Officer, Keesara Division, in Proc. No.L/587/2016, granted Section 38-E certificate over Survey No.430, founded entirely upon the restoration order dated 27.01.2017 and passed during the subsistence of the CIRP moratorium, rendering it void. On 25.02.2025, the National Company Law Tribunal approved the final Resolution Plan submitted by M/s Jalavihar Entertainment Private Limited Consortium, and a new Board of Directors took over Respondent No.5; and that on 08.08.2025, during post-CIRP scrutiny of title documents, the new management discovered the Revenue Divisional Officer's order dated 24.09.2019 and the underlying tenancy proceedings.
n. Respondent No.5 filed Appeal No.F2/2151/2025 on 26.09.2025 challenging the order dated 24.09.2019, obtained legal opinion dated 29.09.2025 conclusively ascertaining the fraud after verification of the mortgage, the anterior records and the encumbrances, and filed Appeal No.F2/2156/2025 on 28.10.2025 challenging the restoration order dated 27.01.2017, invoking Section 17 of the Limitation Act, 1963. Survey No.430 surfaces as tenancy land only in an anomalous, internally inconsistent composite entry in the succession proceedings A/122/2003 and in certain pahani occupancy columns where additional survey numbers appear introduced through the expression "Vagaira", which entries were denounced as interpolated and bogus by rival members of the same family as far back as 2004. That even assuming, though denied, that the Petitioners' ancestors ever held a tenancy interest in Survey No.430, they themselves executed the Registered Sale Deed dated 27.06.1985 and took the consideration, and, under Section 38-D of the Tenancy Act, forfeited all rights in the land, being estopped by deed from afterwards setting up a subsisting tenancy, no person being permitted to approbate and reprobate. The Section 50-B validation dated 08.02.1972 in File No.B2/2412/1971 covered Survey No.430 as well as Survey Nos.414, 416, 417 and 419, but the appeals of 1992 challenged only Survey Nos.414, 416, 417 and 419, Survey No.430 never having been put in issue, so that the 1997 order neither did nor could disturb the Section 50-B validation insofar as Survey No.430 is concerned.
o. The succession order dated 01.05.2003 is purely declaratory of heirship and confers no title, ownership or possession, and that the recognition therein was limited to an aggregate extent of only Ac.5-00 guntas across several survey numbers, whereas the restoration order of 2017 restored Ac.10-00 guntas and the 2019 certificate covered the entire Ac.14-08 guntas, an escalating and unexplained quantum indicative of non-application of mind and of a collusive and engineered design.
p. The defrauding of the Company by the erstwhile Managing Director, Sri Gokaraju Srinivasa Chakravarthi Raju, who hatched the fraudulent scheme in collusion with the legal heirs of the original protected tenants, has resulted in various criminal cases, including by the Central Bureau of Investigation and the Directorate of Enforcement, being registered against him, which are presently pending. A single writ petition challenging the common order dated 21.05.2026 is not maintainable, the order disposing of two separate and independent appeals, Appeal No.F2/2151/2025 against the Section 38-E order and Appeal No.F2/2156/2025 against the restoration order, each arising from a distinct order passed by a distinct authority under distinct statutory provisions and constituting a separate and independent cause of action.
q. Reliance was placed upon A.V. Papayya Sastry v. Government of A.P.1, Meghmala v. G. Narasimha Reddy2, State of Punjab v. Gurdev Singh3, S.P. Chengalvaraya Naidu v. Jagannath4, Pallav Sheth v. Custodian5, Alchemist Asset Reconstruction Co. v. Hotel Gaudavan (P) Ltd.6 and Innoventive Industries Ltd. v. ICICI Bank7 for the propositions that an order obtained by fraud is non est and can be challenged at any time, that fraud unravels all statutory bars including res judicata, that a void order is not clothed with validity by limitation, that a party guilty of fraud cannot have limitation run in its favour, and that proceedings taken against a corporate debtor during the subsistence of the moratorium under Section 14 of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016 are a nullity.
Petitioners filed Reply contending that the allegations levelled in the Counter Affidavit are false and denied, and, more particularly, contended as under:
a. The Andhra Pradesh (Telangana Area) Tenancy and Agricultural Lands Act, 1950 is a beneficial social welfare legislation requiring liberal and purposive interpretation so as to advance the object of the legislation, as held by the Hon'ble Supreme Court in Edukanti Kistamma v. S. Venkatareddy8, as approved in Thota Sridhar Reddy v. Mandala Ramulamma9, the provisions relating to protected tenancy, succession, restoration and ownership being required to be construed in favour of preserving statutory rights unless lawfully extinguished in the manner prescribed under the Act.
b. It was admitted that the protected tenants Kondapuram @ Dasari Chandra Reddy and Nomula Laxma Reddy were shown as executants in the Sale Deed dated 27.06.1985 bearing Document No.4707 of 1985 in favour of Smt. Meda Shobha Reddy, but it was denied that such execution extinguished the protected tenancy rights or amounted to a lawful surrender under the Act, such rights being statutory and terminable only in the manner prescribed under the Act, Respondent No.5 having neither pleaded nor established any valid surrender, termination or extinguishment in accordance with law.
c. It was denied that Survey No.430 never formed part of the protected tenancy holding, it being contended that the recitals of Sale Deed No.4707 of 1985 itself categorically state that the Vendors 2 to 7 are protected tenants and their names have been included in the protected tenants Register accordingly. This admitted recital constituting a clear acknowledgment of the existence of protected tenants whose names were reflected in the Final Protected Tenancy Register. The certified copy of the Final Protected Tenancy Register obtained by the Petitioners reflects that the land in Survey No.430 is included therein, carrying a presumption of correctness unless set aside or modified by a competent authority.
d. The Chessala Pahani and other pahanis categorically reflect protected tenants in respect of Survey No.430, the Pahani of 1955-58 recording Survey No.430, extent Ac.14-08 guntas, Pattadars Venugopal Rao, Sudarshan Rao and Tulisamma, with possessors Kondapuram Chandraiah and Nomula Laxmaiah recorded as Protected Tenants and the nature of cultivation recorded as "Kavuldar", and the Pahani of 1972-73 recording the same Survey No.430 and extent, Pattadar Laxmi Narsamma, with possessors Protected Tenants K. Chandraiah and N. Laxmaiah, nature of cultivation Kavulu".
e. Respondent No.5 traces its title through the Section 50-B validation proceedings in File No.B2/2412/71 which were set aside by the Joint Collector, Ranga Reddy District, vide orders dated 11.08.1997 in Proc. Nos.B4/156/92 to 160/92 on the specific finding that the transactions were validated in violation of Sections 19 and 38-D of the Tenancy Act, such that Respondent No.5, whose claim is derived from invalidated proceedings, cannot claim lawful title or dispute the statutory rights of the Petitioners.
f. In Succession Proc.No.A/122/2003 dated 01.05.2003, the Mandal Revenue Officer categorically recorded that Sri Dasari Chandraiah and Nomula Laxmaiah were shown as protected tenants in respect of various lands including Survey No.430, and that the succession proceedings, having been carried in appeal to Proceedings Nos.F2/3226/2004 and F2/3227/2004, dismissed on 21.12.2004, and Civil Revision Petitions Nos.597 to 600 of 2005, dismissed as withdrawn/not pressed on 28.03.2012, attained finality.
g. Protected tenancy can be surrendered or terminated only in accordance with Section 19 of the Tenancy Act and other relevant provisions including Section 38-D, and that Respondent No.5 had neither pleaded nor established any valid surrender in accordance with Section 19, there being no material to show that the alleged surrender was voluntary, lawful and in conformity with the mandatory statutory requirements. Respondent No.5 had taken totally inconsistent stands, approbating and reprobating on the one hand by claiming title through the registered sale deed flowing from Smt. Meda Shobha Reddy and the protected tenants, and, on the other hand, contrarily asserting that Survey No.430 is not part of the tenancy records. The averment that Respondent No.5's title flows from a clear and continuous chain of registered conveyances was denied as false, it being contended that once the root transaction, namely the Section 50-B validation, is held invalid, all subsequent conveyances flowing therefrom are incapable of conferring lawful title, no person being able to convey a better title than what he himself possesses.
h. It is stated, creation of mortgage in favour of Union Bank of India and the recovery proceedings initiated by the financial institutions do not validate or perfect the title of Respondent No.5, the Company having acquired title only in the year 2010, whereas the protected tenants had already challenged the Section 50-B validation as early as 1992, which was set aside in 1997, much prior to the Company's purchase and the creation of the mortgage. The allegations of fraud, collusion, conspiracy and fabrication levelled against the Petitioners, their predecessors and the erstwhile Managing Director were denied as false and fabricated, protected tenancy rights of the Petitioners being founded upon statutory records and not upon any collusive act, and no competent Court, Tribunal or authority having ever recorded a finding that the orders dated 27.01.2017 or 24.09.2019 were obtained by fraud, the plea of fraud being a mere afterthought raised to overcome delay.
Reliance placed by Respondent No.5 upon the present physical condition of the land, including the alleged existence of a golf course, buildings, internal roads and landscaping, was denied as legally irrelevant, protected tenancy rights being statutory rights determined with reference to the status of the land on the relevant dates recognised under the Act and incapable of being defeated by subsequent unilateral acts of purchasers or developers. Pursuant to the restoration proceedings, possession of the subject property was handed over to the Petitioners and their predecessors-in-interest, the proceedings having attained finality, and Respondent No.5, never having challenged the possession proceedings at the relevant time, is estopped from contending that the restoration order was never implemented.
j. The contention that Section 38-E Certificate dated 24.09.2019 is non est on account of the CIRP moratorium was denied, proceedings under the Tenancy Act relating to pre-existing statutory rights of protected tenants and not constituting recovery proceedings against the Corporate Debtor, the certificate being merely a formal recognition of ownership already vested pursuant to the statutory notification under Section 38-E with effect from 01.01.1973. The plea of discovery of fraud by the “new management” in 2025 was denied as untenable, Respondent No.5 continuing to remain the same corporate entity notwithstanding the change in management, the proceedings culminating in the orders dated 27.01.2017 and 24.09.2019 having been contested by Respondent No.5 itself, which had filed counters and written submissions therein, so that the Company had full knowledge of the proceedings from their inception.
k. The proceedings of the 73rd, 74th and 75th Committee of Creditors Meetings conclusively establish that Respondent No.5 had full knowledge of the existence of the protected tenants prior to approval of the Resolution Plan, and Respondent No.5 acquired the assets of the Corporate Debtor on an "as is where is", "as is what is", "whatever there is" and "without recourse" basis, with full awareness of the subsisting protected tenancy rights. The orders dated 01.05.2003, 27.01.2017 and 24.09.2019 were passed by competent statutory authorities, remained unchallenged for several years and attained finality, the order dated 27.01.2017 having been acted upon with possession delivered, and the Ownership Certificate dated 24.09.2019 having remained unquestioned for more than six years.
l. The Appeals filed by Respondent No.5 were instituted after an extraordinary delay of nearly eight years and six years respectively, without any application for condonation of delay, and that the appellate authority failed to adjudicate the Petitioners' preliminary objection on limitation and proceeded to allow the Appeals on merits, denying the Petitioners a fair and reasonable opportunity to file their counters and objections.
Heard Sri E. Ajay Reddy, learned Senior Counsel assisted by Ms. E. Anisha Reddy, learned counsel for petitioners, learned Government Pleader for Revenue on behalf of Respondents 1 to 4, Sri S. Niranjan Reddy, learned Senior Counsel assisted by Ms. Rubaina S. Khatoon, learned counsel for Respondent No.5.
Having perused the material on record and having heard learned counsel on either side, the following points arise for determination in this Writ Petition:
Whether a composite writ petition assailing the common order dated 21.05.2026, which disposes of two Appeals bearing distinct numbers, is maintainable; ii. Whether Survey No.430 formed part of the protected tenancy holding of the Petitioners' predecessors so as to sustain the restoration order dated 27.01.2017 and the Section 38-E Certificate dated 24.09.2019; iii. Whether the Appeals preferred by Respondent No.5 before the 2nd Respondent were within limitation, having regard to Section 93 of the Tenancy Act read with Section 17 of the Limitation Act, 1963; iv. Whether the Section 38-E Certificate dated 24.09.2019, having been granted during the subsistence of the moratorium under Section 14 of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016, could be sustained in law; and
Whether in the totality of the facts and circumstances, the impugned common order dated 21.05.2026 calls for interference by this Court in the exercise of its jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution of India.
Point No. i : Learned Senior Counsel for Respondent No.5 has urged that the impugned common order, though passed in a single proceeding, in truth, disposes of two distinct Appeals. Appeal No.F2/2151/2025, directed against Section 38-E order dated 24.09.2019, and Appeal No.F2/2156/2025, directed against restoration order dated 27.01.2017, each arising from an order of a different authority under a different statutory provision, and that a single writ petition assailing both is, for that reason, not maintainable. This Court is unable to accept the said objection as one warranting rejection of the Writ Petition at the threshold. Both the Appeals concerned the very same parties, the very same subject land in Survey No.430, and were heard together and disposed of by a common, reasoned order on the same date. The cause of action for Petitioners, namely their grievance against the common order dated 21.05.2026, is singular and indivisible, notwithstanding that the order itself traces its origin to two Appeals. To require Petitioners to file two separate writ petitions assailing what is, in substance and form, one order would be to elevate procedural technicality over substance and would serve no purpose other than needless multiplicity of proceedings. This point is accordingly, answered against Respondent No.5, and Writ Petition is held to be maintainable in its present form.
Point No. ii: This is the pivotal question in the Writ Petition, for unless Petitioners are able to demonstrate that Survey No.430 was, in fact and in law, part of the protected tenancy holding of their predecessors, the entire edifice of their claim, the succession, the restoration of possession, and Section 38-E Certificate, must necessarily collapse. It bears emphasis at the outset that this Court, sitting in writ jurisdiction, does not re-appreciate the tenancy records as a court of first appeal would, and confines itself to examining whether the finding recorded by the 2nd Respondent on this aspect is supported by the material on record and is free from perversity or jurisdictional error. Upon a careful examination, on that limited touchstone, of the foundational tenancy records placed before the 2nd Respondent and relied upon before this Court, this Court is unable to hold that the finding of the 2nd Respondent, that Survey No.430 was not shown to have been validly recorded as protected tenancy land to the extent now claimed, suffers from any such infirmity.
The Final Protected Tenancy Register, which is the primary and foundational document under the Act, records the tenancy of Kondapuram Chandra Reddy only in respect of Survey Nos. 417/A, 421, 426 and 427. Section 38-E Ownership Certificate dated 19.05.1975, issued vide Proc.No.196/LRE/75, was similarly confined to Ac.30-25 guntas in the very same four survey numbers, and did not extend to Survey No 430. It is on record that this very certificate was itself set aside on appeal by order dated 27.03.1979 in Appeal No.B4/9678/75 and remanded for fresh enquiry; the outcome of that remanded enquiry is not separately placed before this Court, but it is significant that the subsequent statutory proceedings culminating in the Section 40 succession order dated 14.02.2003 and the ownership order dated 05.06.2004, both of which post-date the remand by over two decades, continued to exclude Survey No.430, indicating that whatever transpired in the remanded enquiry did not result in recognition of tenancy over Survey No.430. The common order of the Joint Collector dated 11.08.1997, passed in the very appeals through which the Petitioners' predecessors themselves challenged the regularization proceedings of 1972, dealt only with Survey Nos.414, 416, 417 and 419, and is conspicuously silent as to Survey No.430. The Section 40 succession order dated 14.02.2003 in Proc. No. A/30/2003 concerned only Survey Nos. 417, 418 and 419, while the ownership order of the Revenue Divisional Officer dated 05.06.2004 in Proc. No. L/3601/03 granted ownership only in Survey Nos. 414, 416 and 419. Every one of these foundational contemporaneous records, spanning a period of nearly three decades, is consistent in excluding Survey No.430 from the protected tenancy holding of the Petitioners' predecessors.
Against this consistent documentary trail, Petitioners place principal reliance upon the succession proceedings dated 01.05.2003 and upon certain pahani entries. This Court has examined these documents with care. The succession order of 01.05.2003 itself, even on Petitioners' own showing, recognized their predecessors in respect of an aggregate extent of only Acs.5-00 guntas spread across several survey numbers including Survey No.430, and not the entire extent of Acs.14-08 guntas comprised in that survey number. A succession order under Section 40 of the Act is, in any event, declaratory of heirship alone; it does not create, enlarge or confer tenancy where none otherwise existed. The pahani entries relied upon, insofar as they seek to bring Survey No.430 within the tenancy holding, do so through the composite and internally inconsistent expression "Vagaira", an expression which, as the record itself discloses, was denounced as interpolated and bogus by rival members of the very same family as far back as the year 2004, long before the present controversy arose and long before Respondent No.5 had any occasion to raise the issue. The doubt surrounding these entries is not, therefore, a construct devised for the purposes of this litigation.
Equally significant is the trajectory by which the extent of the claim is described, at each successive stage, differently: an aggregate of only Acs.5-00 guntas, spread across several survey numbers, recognized in the 2003 succession order; Acs.10-00 guntas restored by the order dated 27.01.2017; and, on Respondent No.5's own case, the entire Acs.14-08 guntas comprised in Survey No.430 said to have been nominally covered by the Section 38-E Certificate dated 24.09.2019. It is the figure of Acs.10-00 guntas, being the extent that formed the actual subject matter of cancellation under the impugned common order dated 21.05.2026 and consequently of the present writ petition, with which this Court is directly concerned; the wider figure of Acs.14-08 guntas is adverted to only insofar as Respondent No.5 relies upon it to demonstrate that the extent attributed to the Petitioners' claim did not remain constant across the succession, restoration and Section 38-E proceedings. No explanation, documentary or otherwise, has been placed before this Court for the manner in which the limited aggregate extent recognized under the 2003 succession order came to be described as a materially larger and differing extent in the subsequent proceedings. Such an unexplained variance in the extent of a statutory claim, at each stage without reference to the foundational records, is a circumstance which detracts from the credibility of the restoration and Section 38-E proceedings and lends support to the finding of the 2nd Respondent that those proceedings were not preceded by any adequate verification of the underlying tenancy records.
Of considerable significance is the admitted fact, that the very protected tenants through whom the Petitioners claim, namely Kondapuram @ Dasari Chandra Reddy and Nomula Laxma Reddy, themselves joined as executants in the Registered Sale Deed dated 27.06.1985 bearing Document No.4707/1985 in favour of Smt. Meda Shobha Reddy, and received consideration thereunder. Petitioners explain this admitted circumstance by contending that their predecessors executed the said document merely in the capacity of confirming parties, that the recital in the sale deed describing the vendors as protected tenants whose names were included in the Protected Tenancy Register in fact acknowledges subsisting tenancy, and that no valid surrender within the meaning of Section 19 of the Tenancy Act has ever been pleaded or established by Respondent No.5. This Court is not called upon, in the exercise of its jurisdiction under Article 226, to itself pronounce upon the ultimate legal effect of the 1985 sale deed as a question of statutory surrender under Section 19 or forfeiture under Section 38-D, that being a matter within the province of the authorities under the Tenancy Act. What this Court does find is that the admitted execution of a registered conveyance by the protected tenants themselves, for consideration, over the very land now claimed, constitutes a material circumstance which, in the absence of any satisfactory explanation placed on record as to the continuance of the tenancy thereafter or as to possession having remained with the Petitioners' predecessors independent of the subsequent statutory certificates, substantially supports the finding of the 2nd Respondent that the tenancy claim over Survey No.430, as subsequently asserted, could not be accepted on the material produced.
The reliance placed by Petitioners upon Edukanti Kistamma v. S. Venkatareddy as approved in Thota Sridhar Reddy v. Mandala Ramulamma for the proposition that the Tenancy Act must be liberally and purposively construed so as to preserve the rights of protected tenants, does not assist the Petitioners in the facts of the present case. The principle of beneficial construction operates to resolve genuine ambiguity in favour of a protected tenant whose statutory status is otherwise established; it cannot be pressed into service to conjure a tenancy over land which the foundational, contemporaneous statutory records themselves never recorded as tenanted, nor to override the effect of a registered conveyance voluntarily executed by the tenants themselves for consideration. Liberal construction is an aid to interpretation of an established right; it is not a substitute for its proof.
This Court's jurisdiction under Article 226 does not extend to sitting in appeal over findings of fact recorded by a statutory authority upon an appreciation of the material on record, and this Court has accordingly examined the reasoning of the 2nd Respondent not to substitute its own view of the evidence, but only to satisfy itself that the conclusion reached is not perverse, is not unsupported by the record, and does not suffer from any error apparent on the face of the record or want of jurisdiction. Tested on this standard, this Court finds no perversity or jurisdictional error in the finding of the 2nd Respondent that Survey No.430 was not shown, on the foundational tenancy records, to have formed part of the protected tenancy holding of the Petitioners' predecessors to the extent of Acs.10-00 guntas actually restored and covered by the impugned appellate order, and that the restoration order dated 27.01.2017 and Section 38-E Certificate dated 24.09.2019, resting as they do upon the succession order of 2003 and the disputed pahani entries without reference to the foundational Register, could not be sustained. Point (ii) is accordingly answered against Petitioners.
Point No. iii to v : Section 93 of the Tenancy Act imports the provisions of Sections 5 and 12 to 24 of the Limitation Act, 1963 to proceedings under the Act, and it is not in dispute that Section 17 of the Limitation Act, which postpones the commencement of the period of limitation in a case of fraud to the date on which the fraud is, or with reasonable diligence could have been, discovered, is accordingly available party before the authorities constituted under the Tenancy Act. The Petitioners contend that the Appeals, filed on 26.09.2025 and 28.10.2025 respectively against orders dated 24.09.2019 and 27.01.2017, were hopelessly belated and that the 2nd Respondent erred in invoking Section 17 without a specific application for condonation of delay and without a conclusive finding of fraud recorded after trial.
This Court finds that the plea of limitation cannot be considered in isolation from the events surrounding the change in management of Respondent No.5. It is not disputed that Respondent No.5 was admitted into Corporate Insolvency Resolution Process by order dated 09.04.2019 of the National Company Law Tribunal, Hyderabad Bench, in C.P.(I.B.) No.43/7/HDB/2018, that its Board of Directors stood superseded upon such admission, and that the Resolution Plan submitted by M/s Jalavihar Entertainment Private Limited Consortium was approved only on 25.02.2025, whereupon a new Board took charge of the Company on what both parties describe as a clean slate. It is the specific case of Respondent No.5 that the new management discovered the existence of the order dated 24.09.2019 and the underlying restoration order only on 08.08.2025, during post-CIRP scrutiny of title documents, obtained a considered legal opinion dated 29.09.2025 after verifying the mortgage, the anterior records and the encumbrances, and thereupon moved with reasonable promptitude, filing Appeal No.F2/2151/2025 on 26.09.2025 and Appeal No.F2/2156/2025 on 28.10.2025. Petitioners, for their part, dispute this case, contending that Respondent No.5 continues to be the very same corporate entity that contested the proceedings culminating in the orders dated 27.01.2017 and 24.09.2019, and that the Committee of Creditors was, in any event, aware of the existence of a tenancy dispute concerning Survey No.430 prior to approval of the Resolution Plan. This contrary case is considered immediately below,
Petitioners seek to impute to the present management the knowledge that the erstwhile management, under the erstwhile Managing Director Sri Gokaraju Srinivasa Chakravarthi Raju, undoubtedly, possessed; it is not in dispute that the erstwhile management contested the proceedings culminating in the orders dated 27.01.2017 and 24.09.2019 and yet chose, deliberately, never to appeal the restoration order. It is a well-settled principle, illustrated in S.P. Chengalvaraya Naidu v. Jagannath and Pallav Sheth v. Custodian, that a party guilty of practising a fraud cannot be permitted to derive the benefit of limitation running in its own favour by virtue of that very fraud, and it would be a curious application of this principle to visit upon the Company, now under new and unconnected management following a resolution process specifically designed to place the corporate debtor on a fresh footing, the consequences of a fraud allegedly practised by its own erstwhile Managing Director in collusion with the very persons who now assert rights against the Company. The proceedings of the Committee of Creditors, while they may indicate that the pendency of some tenancy dispute was known at the level of the Committee prior to 25.02.2025, do not, by themselves, establish that the new Board of Directors, which assumed charge only upon approval of the Resolution Plan, had actual knowledge of the fraud, collusion and suppression underlying the orders dated 27.01.2017 and 24.09.2019, as opposed to bare knowledge of a disputed claim noted for diligence purposes. This distinction between hare knowledge of a pending dispute and knowledge of the fraud and suppression said to underlie it is one that the 2nd Respondent was entitled to draw, and this Court, examining the matter within the confines of its writ jurisdiction, finds no perversity or jurisdictional error in the conclusion reached by the 2nd Respondent that the benefit of Section 17 of the Limitation Act was available to Respondent No.5, and that the Appeals, filed within a matter of weeks of the discovery pleaded by Respondent No.5, were within time.
It is not in dispute that the Corporate Insolvency Resolution Process against Respondent No.5 commenced upon the admission order dated 09.04.2019, and that a moratorium under Section 14 of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016 came into operation from that date and continued until the approval of the Resolution Plan on 25.02.2025. The order dated 24.09.2019, by which the 3rd Respondent granted the Section 38-E Certificate over Survey No.430 in favour of the legal representatives of the protected tenants, was thus passed squarely within this period. This Court is in agreement with the proposition, well settled by the decisions in Alchemist Asset Reconstruction Co. v. Hotel Gaudavan (P) Ltd. and Innoventive Industries Ltd. v. ICICI Bank that moratorium under Section 14 of the Code is of wide sweep and overriding effect. This Court is mindful that Respondent No.5 was not itself a party to the proceedings culminating in the order dated 24.09.2019, and that the question whether a recognition proceeding of this nature, to which the corporate debtor was not a party, falls within the class of proceedings contemplated by Section 14(1) of the Code is not entirely free from difficulty and need not be conclusively pronounced upon in this writ petition. What is, however, clear on the record is that the said order had the direct effect of creating a claim over, and divesting the corporate debtor of an interest in, an asset forming part of the insolvency estate, that this occurred without the knowledge, participation or sanction of the Interim Resolution Professional then in charge of the Company's affairs, and that even the formal written arguments filed by the erstwhile management on 29.06.2019 in the very same proceedings did not disclose the pendency of the Corporate Insolvency Resolution Process. These circumstances, whatever their precise legal characterisation under Section 14, lend further support to, and are consistent with, the finding already recorded under Point (ii) above that the order dated 24.09.2019 could not be sustained; this Court accordingly treats the moratorium as reinforcing and not as an independently sufficient or freestanding, ground for declining to interfere with the impugned common order dated 21.05.2026 insofar as it set aside the said certificate.
It remains to notice one further circumstance material to the exercise of this Court's discretionary jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution of India. The Registered Sale Deed dated 27.06.1985, executed by the Petitioners' own predecessors and forming the very foundation of the controversy, finds no mention in the affidavit filed by the Petitioners in support of the writ petition, and came to light only through the Counter Affidavit filed by Respondent No.5. A litigant who approaches a Court of equity under Article 226 is obliged to place before it every fact material to the adjudication of the controversy, and the suppression of a document of this consequence, executed by the Petitioners' own ancestors and going to the very root of the tenancy claim, is not a matter this Court can pass over. It is well settled, as held in A.V. Papayya Sastry v. Government of A.P. and Meghmala v. G. Narasimha Reddy, the latter arising under this very statute, that fraud and suppression of material facts vitiate even the most solemn of proceedings and disentitle a party to discretionary relief. While this Court has independently examined the merits of the controversy rather than resting its conclusion on the suppression alone, the fact of such suppression reinforces, and does not detract from the conclusion that Petitioners failed to make out a case warranting interference with the impugned common order.
This Court has also considered the contention that the impugned order is self-contradictory inasmuch as the 2nd Respondent observed that certain matters, such as the alleged interpolation of pahani entries, would require detailed examination, while yet proceeding to allow the Appeals. Having examined the impugned order, this Court finds no such infirmity. The 2nd Respondent rested his conclusion substantially upon the foundational tenancy records and the limited scope of the succession proceedings, in particular the facts that the Final Protected Tenancy Register Proceedings No.A/30/2003 and Proceedings No.L/3601/03 excluded Survey No.430 altogether, and that Proceedings No.A/122/2003, while referring to Survey No.430, did so only as part of a limited aggregate extent of Ac.5-00 guntas spread across several survey numbers, which did not establish protected tenancy over Survey No.430 to the extent subsequently claimed in the restoration and Section 38-E proceedings, as this Court has itself considered under Point (ii) above. Where the foundational record is thus dispositive, a remand for further enquiry into peripheral matters such as the alleged interpolation serves no purpose, and the 2nd Respondent cannot be faulted for having declined to order one.
For the reasons recorded above, this Court finds that the impugned common order dated 21.05.2026 passed by the 2nd Respondent in Appeal Nos.F2/2151/2025 and F2/2156/2025 does not suffer from any illegality, arbitrariness, or jurisdictional error warranting interference under Article 226 of the Constitution of India. Petitioners failed to establish that Survey No.430 formed part of the protected tenancy holding of their predecessors to the extent claimed, the Appeals preferred by Respondent No.5 were within limitation having regard to Section 17 of the Limitation Act, 1963 as applicable through Section 93 of the Tenancy Act, and the circumstance that the order dated 24.09.2019 was passed during the subsistence of the moratorium under Section 14 of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016, without the knowledge or sanction of the Interim Resolution Professional, further reinforces the conclusion that the said order could not be sustained. The writ petition, being devoid of merit, accordingly fails.
In the result, the Writ Petition is dismissed and the common order dated 21.05.2026 passed by the 2nd Respondent in Appeal Nos. F2/2151/2025 and F2/2156/2025 is confirmed. No costs.
Consequently, the miscellaneous Applications, if any shall stand closed.