S.D.Khare, J. - (1.) This is a petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India and the prayer is that the orders dated November 14, 1962, and April 22, 1963, passed by opposite parties 2 and 3, be quashed by a writ in the nature of certiorari, and the U.P. Imposition of Ceiling on Land Holdings Act, 1961, U.P. Act No. 1 of 1961, be declared as ultra vires and inoperative.
(2.) U.P. Act No. 1 of 1961 has already been declared by this court to be intra vires-vide Sri K.N. Agarwala v. State of U.P. and another, Civil Misc. Writ No. 2147 of 1961, connected with Civil Misc. Writ No. 2633 of 1962, decided on July 26, 1963 . The petition has, therefore, been pressed so far as the other relief claimed is concerned.
(3.) The petitioner is the recorded tenure holder of several holdings situate in village Geondi, tahsil Mahoba, district Hamirpur. Some of these holdings were bhumidhari and the others were sirdari in character. The area of all the holdings was much in excess of the ceiling fixed under Act No. 1 of 1961. In reply to the notice which was issued to the petitioner under Section 10 of U.P. Act 1 of 1961 the reply given by him was that there was a family arrangement amongst the members of the family, that a partition had taken place and that the land which was in possession of the family was not in excess of the ceiling. Exemption was also claimed in respect of certain land as threshing floor and grove. The petitioner relied on an unregistered document dated July 1, 1959 and the mutation report dated August 27, 1959. The Prescribed Authority, Mahoba, opposite party No. 3, and on appeal the II Civil Judge, Banda, opposite party No. 2, held that the document evidencing the family arrangement could not be taken into consideration as it was unregistered and that the alleged partition had not been given effect to till August 20, 1959. Both the authorities, therefore, did not take into consideration the alleged family arrangement. They further held that the alleged threshing floor was actually under cultivation and, therefore, could not be exempted and there was no grove on any part of the holding.;