Satish Chandra, J. - (1.) DURING consolidation operations the petitioners filed an objection claiming to be co-sharers in the holding. Their claim was contested by respondents 4 and 5. One of the issues framed by the Consolidation Officer was whether Beni and Gappu died before the death of Chandi, if so, its effect. In support of their Case that Chandi had died before the other two, the petitioners had, inter alia filed extracts from death registers. The Consolidation officer after considering the evidence on record, held that Gappu and Beni died before Chandi. On, inter alia, this finding the objection of the petitioners was rejected. The petitioners went up in appeal. The Settlement Officer elaborately discussed the extracts from the death registers and rejected them. He confirmed the finding of the consolidation Officer and dismissed the appeal. The petitioners filed a revision. The Deputy Director of Consolidation stated that he had carefully gone through the record of the case in the two courts below and heard the arguments of the learned counsel for the applicants as well as those of the learned counsel for the opposite parties. The arguments put forward before him by the learned counsel for the applicants were not new and were the same which had been put forward before the two learned lower courts. He observed:- "For the reasons already mentioned in great detail in the orders of both the learned lower courts I do not find any force whatsoever in those arguments. I find myself in agreement with the conclusion drawn and the findings arrived at by the two learned lower courts and I do not find any good justification to interfere with them. I do not even consider it necessary to repeat these points in this order." On this view the revision was dismissed. Aggrieved, the petitioners filed a writ petition in this Court. For the Petitioners it was argued that the Deputy Director of Consolidation was in error in not considering the material evidence adduced by the petitioners to support their case. In support reliance was placed upon a decision of the Division Bench in Chedda Lal v. Sub-Divisional Officer 1971 All LJ 857 = (AIR 1972 All 51). The Bench felt doubtful about the correctness of this decision. After referring to several Supreme Court decisions it observed:- "In view of the aforementioned decisions the question whether omission to consider material evidence can furnish a ground for interference in a writ petition requires consideration by a Full Bench we, therefore, refer the following question to a Full Bench:- "Whether an order or a finding of a Court or tribunal, based on evidence on the record, can be interfered with under Article 226 of the Constitution, if some material evidence has not been referred to by the court or the tribunal?" In the penultimate paragraph of the referring order the emphasis has been placed on omission to consider. We have reframed the question as follows:- "Whether an order or a finding of a court or tribunal, based on evidence on the record, can be interfered with under Article 226 of the Constitution, if some material evidence to the contrary has been ignored from consideration by the court or the tribunal?"
(2.) IN Girijanandini Devi v. Bijendra Narain Choudhary (AIR 1967 SC 1124) (Para 12) the Supreme Court held that:- "It is not the duty of the appellate Court when it agrees with the view of the Trial Court on the evidence either to restate the effect of the evidence or to reiterate the reasons given by the Trial Court. Expression of general agreement with reasons given by the Court decision of which is under appeal would ordinarily suffice." In State of Madras v. A.R. Srinivasan (AIR 1966 SC 1827) it was held that it is unreasonable to suggest that a superior authority must record its reasons as to why it accepts the findings of the inferior authority. The matter was examined in detail by a Full Bench of this Court in Haji Manzoor Ahmad v. State of U. P. 1968 All LJ 809 = (AIR 1970 All 468 (FB)). It was held that:- "Where an order of an inferior authority is carried in appeal or revision before a superior authority and the superior authority in disposing of the appeal or revision makes an order in the exercise of quasi- judicial jurisdiction:- (1) In all cases where the superior authority interferes with the order of the inferior authority the order of the superior authority must set out its reasons. (2) In cases where the superior authority merely affirms the order of the inferior authority, and (a) where the order of the inferior authority does not set out its reasons, the inferior authority must disclose its reasons its order; (b) where the order of the inferior authority sets out the reasons, and (i) where the superior authority finds reasons of the inferior authority acceptable to it, it need not specify the reasons in its order but may merely refer to the reasons given by the inferior authority or give an outline of the process of reasoning by which it finds itself in agreement with the inferior authority; (ii) where the superior authority does find the reasons of the inferior authority acceptable to it the superior authority must set out its own reasons in its order."
(3.) THE view of this Full Bench was re-affirmed by a Larger Bench in Ram Murti Saran v. State of U. P. 1970 All LJ 1177 = (AIR 1971 All 54) (FB), as well as Prem Prakash Virmani v. State Government 1970 All LJ 1197 = (AIR 1971 All 82) (FB);