P.B. Chakravartti, J. - (1.) In my opinion, this appeal by the State of West Bengal is unarguable. Mr. Das Gupta, who appears for the State, gave us the relevant notifications and their dates in a convenient form. It would appear that the respondents are interested in only two plots of land which bear respectively the numbers 535 and 536. On the 29th of June, 1950, a notification was issued under section 4 of the Land Development and Planning Act in respect of those two plots of land and several other plots. That was Notification No. 7268. On the same day, there was another Notification under sections 6 and 7 of the same Act and that was Notification No. 7270. Obviously the two Notifications were issued on the same date, consistently with the practice then followed by the State under which they crowded notices designed for different stages into one and the same date. For some reason which does not appear to be very clear, there was a second Notification under section 4 of the Act on the 30th of October, 1950, covering plots Nos. 535 and 536 and certain other plots. That was Notification No. 11836. Once again there was a Notification under sections 6 and 7 of the Act in respect of the same plots issued on the same date. That Notification was No. 11838. After the Government had completed the issue of two pairs of Notifications, one on the 29th of June, and another on the 30th of October the respondent moved this Court on the 14th of March, 1951, and obtained the Rule out of which the present appeal has arisen.
(2.) It seems that the Rule set the appellant Government thinking. On the 15th of June, 1951, they issued yet another Notification by which they purported to cancel so much of Notification No. 11836 issued under section 4 of the Act as related to plots Nos. 535 and 536 as also to certain other plots. That Notification was No. 7782. It was followed, consistently with what had happened before, by a third Notification under sections 6 and 7 which related to plots Nos. 535 and 536 as also certain other plots but which also cancelled the Notification No. 7270 issued on the 29th of June, 1950, although the date was wrongly given as the 28th of June. That Notification was No. 16038. After issuing that Notification, the appellant Government at last stopped.
(3.) Bose, J., held that the Notifications under sections 6 and 7 of the Act, issued respectively on the 29th of June, 1950, and the 30th of October, 1950, were both bad, inasmuch as they had been held simultaneously with the relevant Notifications under section 4. He had then left with him, so far as the stage prior to the issue of the Rule was concerned, two Notifications under section 4, one issued on the 29th of June, and the other on the 30th of October. The learned Judge held that inasmuch as the appellant Government issued a second Notification in respect of certain of the plots, the first Notification in respect of the same plots must be deemed to have been superseded and, therefore, what was surviving was only Notification No. 11836 issued on the 30th October, 1950. If nothing else had happened, the State Government would be entitled to proceed to issue a declaration under sections 6 and 7 on the basis of the Notification of the 30th of October, 1950. But they had interposed another action of their own by which they completely destroyed the effect of the Notification of the 30th of October, in so far as it related to plots Nos. 535 and 536. It will be recalled that by a Notification issued on the 15th of June. 1951, they cancelled the Notification of the 30th of October, 1950, so far as plots Nos. 535 and 536 were covered by that Notification. That being so, the learned Judge held that after the Notification of the 15th of June, 1951, there was no Notification under section 4 left in respect of plots Nos. 535 and 536 and, therefore, the purported Notification of the 29th of November, 1951, issued under sections 6 and 7 with respect to those plots, was of no effect at all. In the learned Judge's view the State Government had by issuing a multitude of Notifications in quick succession, succeeded in cancelling one another and had been left with nothing on which to take any intelligible stand.;