- (1.) K. C. Agarwal J.-Out of the seven writ petitions, four were filed by the persons whose land have been declared as surplus by the District Judge, Agra by the judgment dated 18-11-1980. The areas declared as surplus are : Writ Nos. Surplus area 1. 5476 of 1981 : 2343.3067 sq. meters 2.302 of 81 : 103.3394 sq. meters 3. 5499 of 81 : 1730.6019 sq. meters 4. 5503 of 81 : 2140.0434 sq meters The remaining three writ petitions have been filed by the State of U. P.
(2.) BY the aforesaid judgment, the District Judge partly set aside the judgments of the Competent Authority, as a result whereof area declared in each one of these writ petitions by the Competent Authority was reduced. Draft statements prepared by the Competent Authority, under Section 6 of the Urban Land (Ceiling and Regulation) Act, 1976 (hereinafter referred to as the 'Act'). An objection was filed by the petitioner Kailash Chand in writ petition no. 5476 of 1981 under Section 6 (1) of the Act stating that he was not possessed of any vacant land in excess of the ceiling area. The Competent Authority dismissed the objection by its order dated 12th September, 1978 holding that the petitioner held surplus vacant land, and, accordingly, directed final statement to be prepared under Section 9 of the said Act. The petitioner filed an appeal under Section 33 of the Act. The appeal was allowed partly by the District Judge. He gave the petitioner benefit of 800.875 sq. meters. Accordingly, the area of land declared as surplus was reduced. By the judgment of the District Judge reducing the area, State of U. P. felt aggrieved and has thus filed the following writ petitions : 1. Writ No. 4031 of 1981, 2. Writ No. 4032 of 1981 and 3. Writ No. 4033 of 1981. On behalf of the State, learned counsel urged that the District Judge committed an error in excluding the land underneath the boundary wall altogether and in not taking the same into account while calculating the extent of the vacant land.
(3.) IN State of U. P. v. L. J. Johnson, 1983 AWC 798 the controversy as to what was to be excluded or what was to be taken into account to calculate the vacant land was considered. The Supreme Court held : "Section 4 (9) contemplates that if a person holds vacant land as also other portion of land on which there is a building with a dwelling unit, the extent of land occupied by the building and the land appurtenant thereto shall be taken into account in calculating the extent of the vacant land." Consequently, the District Judge was wrong in leaving the area underneath the boundary wall for all purposes. The area had to be considered for the purpose mentioned in State U. P. v. L. J. Johnson (supra;. The principles laid down in Johnson's case was that the total area of the land of a land-holder had to be first determined and if the total area, built or unbuilt, fell below the ceiling limit prescribed for a particular category of town, there would be no question of any excess land, but if there is excess land byond the ceiling limit, the same would have to be taken over by the Government. The method of calculation of the ceiling limit has been given by the Supreme Court in this decision.;