GUTHEMMA KOM FAKIRA CHALVADI Vs. BHANGARYA BISTA NAIK DASAN

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE facts of the case are as follows: IT is stated that land bearing survey No. 232, measuring about 8 acres and 19 guntas of Kanthraji village, Sirsi Taluk, North Kannada District was granted to the petitioner's late husband, Fakira Basavanna Chalavadi, on 20.4.1959. He is said to have belonged to a Scheduled caste. The grant was said to be coupled with a condition that it shall not be alienated or sub -divided, in perpetuity. The grant was free of cost. It transpires that Chalavadi died as on 8.12.2002. The petitioner is said to have sought for transfer of the property in her favour after the death of her husband. It is then that she was made aware that her husband and she had executed a sale deed in respect of the property in favour of the first respondent, as on 29.7.1972. According to the petitioner, the said sale transaction was manipulated and fraudulent and was never intended nor consciously executed. The petitioner is hence said to have made an application, dated 22.3.2003, before the third respondent seeking cancellation of the said sale. It was canvassed that the alienation was unlawful and that any alleged permission granted by the third respondent in respect of the sale was without authority of law, as he had no jurisdiction to grant any such permission. The first respondent, who is said to have contested the proceedings, had contended that he had purchased the land in question after obtaining permission from the competent authority in the manner known to law and that the petitioner's husband had not raised any dispute about the transaction during his life time.

(2.) THE application of the petitioner having been rejected by the third respondent, by an order dated 3.11.2004, an appeal was said to have been preferred before the second respondent. While holding that the third respondent was not the competent authority at the relevant point of time to grant permission for the alienation of the land, the appeal is said to have been dismissed as barred by delay and laches. It is that order which is under challenge in this petition. On a consideration of the rival contentions and on a perusal of the record and having due regard to the legal position, it is to be noticed that the appellate authority has found that the Assistant Commissioner, who had granted permission for the alienation by the grantee in favour of the petitioner, was not the competent authority to have granted such permission at the relevant point of time. However, it was also found that the grantee was a willing party to the sale transaction, which was sought to be questioned after several decades and has thus concluded that the sale was saved though the permission granted was not by the competent revenue authority. The above reasoning of the authority cannot be sustained as it is well settled that there is no prescription of any period of limitation in so far as the application of the provisions of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prohibition of Transfer of Certain Lands) Act, 1978 (Hereinafter referred to as the 'PTCL Act', for brevity) is concerned. (See: M. Narayanappa v. The Special Deputy Commissioner, : ILR 2006 Kar. 2506; WA 2887/2004, Hospet Thippanna & another v. Jettappa & others, dated 6.12.2006)

(3.) IT is also to be noticed that the status of the parties, by operation of law also stood altered notwithstanding their intention or conduct. In that, whether a grant had been made under any of the Rules in force in the Bombay area, Coorg District, Hyderabad area, Madras area or Mysore area of the State, with the coming into force of the Mysore Land Grant Rules 1968, (Hereinafter referred to as the 'MLG Rules', for brevity) framed under Section 197 of the Karnataka Land Revenue Act, 1964 (Hereinafter referred to as the 'KLR Act', for brevity), all Rules corresponding to the same, in force in the above areas, stood repealed. Rule 40 of the MLG Rules read as follows: