Yeshchandra (D) By Lrs. vs The State Of Madhya Pradesh

NON-REPORTABLE

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF INDIA CIVIL APPELLATE JURISDICTION

CIVIL APPEAL NO. 5040 OF 2009

YASHCHANDRA (D) BY LRS. …APPELLANT(S)

Versus

THE STATE OF MADHYA PRADESH & ORS. …RESPONDENT(S)

JUDGMENT

Deepak Gupta, J.

1. The State of Madhya Pradesh enacted the Madhya

Pradesh Ceiling on Agricultural Holdings Act, 1960 (hereinafter

referred to as ‘the Act’). The Bill in this regard was published

on 15th September, 1959 and the Act was published on 1st

October, 1960 after receiving the assent of the President of

India. Section 7 of the Act provided the maximum extent of

land to be held by a person and when the Act was initially Signature Not Verified Digitally signed by SANJAY KUMAR passed, a land holder was not entitled to hold land in excess of Date: 2017.09.20 16:19:06 IST Reason:

28 standard acres. Standard acre was defined under Section 2 2(n) of the Act to mean one acre of perennially irrigated land or

two acres of seasonally irrigated land or three acres of dry

land. Section 4 of the Act provided that any transaction of

land by the land holder by way of sale, gift, exchange, partition

etc. could be verified by the competent authority, provided

such transfer of land had been made after the date of

publication of the Bill i.e. 15.09.1959. Sub-section 2 of

Section 4 of the Act provided that this section would not apply

to a transfer made by the land holder who does not hold land

in excess of the ceiling area on the date of transfer. Section 5

of the Act restricts the transfer or sub-division of land after the

coming into force of the Act till final order under Section 11 of

the Act is passed unless the permission of the Collector in

writing is taken before entering into the transaction.

2. One Phoolchand was the owner of 72 acres 75 decimals

of land. Admittedly, this was dry land and, therefore, he was

entitled to hold 84 acres of dry land under the Act. The Act

was amended in the year 1972. We are only concerned with the

Amendment Act of 1972 and the Second Amendment Act of

1972. Both these Acts came into force from 7th March, 1974.

The maximum extent of holding was changed and where the 3

holder of the land was a member of the family of less than 5

members, the family was entitled to retain 15 standard acres of

land, and 18 standard acres of land where a family consisted of

more than 5 persons. As per this amendment, Phoolchand was

at the most entitled to retain 18 standard acres or 54 acres of

dry land. Vide Second Amendment Act, 1972, Section 4 of the

Act was amended and the competent authority was entitled to

set aside any transaction entered into after 24th January, 1971

and before the appointed day, which is 7th March, 1974.

3. After the Act was amended, Phoolchand filed his return

and in his return he did not say that he had leased out any

land to Yashchandra, the original plaintiff who was also the

original appellant before this Court, who is deceased and is

now represented by his legal representatives. It is the admitted

case of the parties that Yashchandra was related to

Phoolchand. Yashchandra filed a petition before the competent

authority under the Act claiming that he was an occupancy

tenant on the eastern part of the land of Phoolchand measuring

25 acres and claimed that this land had been leased out to him

vide lease deed dated 21st November, 1968 on a rental of

Rs. 500/- per annum. He further claimed that since he was in 4

occupation of the land he had got the rights of occupancy

tenant under Section 169 of the Madhya Pradesh Land

Revenue Code, 1959 (hereinafter referred to as ‘the Code’). The

competent authority rejected the objections and declared 20.88

acres of land of Phoolchand as surplus under the Act.

4. Thereafter, Yashchandra filed a suit for declaration of his

occupancy rights in the suit land on the same grounds. In

this suit he claimed that Phoolchand had transferred 24 acres

of land to him in 1968. In this suit a written statement was

filed and in the written statement the State denied that

Phoolchand had created any lease in favour of Yashchandra.

However, it was admitted that the plaintiff was in cultivating

possession of the land. The State, however, took the plea that

the alleged transaction of lease is a sham transaction set up

with an intention to defeat the provisions of the Act.

Phoolchand was defendant in the suit but did not contest the

same. He did not file any written statement. The trial court

dismissed the suit. Yashchandra filed an appeal and the first

appellate court allowed the appeal mainly on the ground that a

lease was created by the document in question and, as such,

the plaintiff had obtained occupancy rights. An appeal was 5

filed by the State and the High Court came to the conclusion

that the alleged deed was a sham transaction. It relied upon

the evidence of the plaintiff himself to come to the conclusion

that the plaintiff was not in possession of the land. This

judgment is challenged before us.

5. Shri Puneet Jain, learned counsel for the appellants has

basically raised two issues- the first is that since the

transaction in question is of the year 1968, the competent

authority had no jurisdiction to invalidate the same either

under the un-amended provisions of the Act or under the

amended provisions of the Act. He submits that when the

transaction took place, the holding of Phoolchand was less

than the maximum prescribed limit and such a transfer was

permissible under section 4(2) of the Act. He further submits

that after the Amendment Act of 1972, the competent authority

could only look into the validity of those documents or

transactions which had been entered into after 24th

January, 1971.

6. This argument seems attractive on first blush. However,

when we carefully peruse the original document, we notice that

by this document [Annexure P-2] Phoolchand states that he 6

has received Rs.2000/- from Yashchandra and that he has

permitted Yashchandra to enclose and cultivate 1/3rd of his

land measuring 24 acres and cultivate the same and only

Rs. 500/- would be deducted. Even after payment of the full

amount of Rs. 2000/-, Yashchandra would be entitled to

cultivate the land for a period of 10 years. This document is

signed only by Phoolchand and it is neither witnessed by

anybody nor registered. This document transfers an interest in

immovable property of more than rupees hundred. It may be

true that under the provisions of the Code oral leases of

agricultural holdings are permissible, but once the lease is

created by a document then the same has to be registered

under the Registration Act. This document is an unregistered

document. The courts below have come to the conclusion that

this document is an ante-dated document. Therefore, this

document cannot be looked into for deciding whether this

document creates any right, title or interest in the appellants.

In our view, in the absence of any registration or any attesting

witness, the document could have easily been manipulated by

Phoolchand and the plaintiff by ante-dating it. 7

7. The second issue raised by Shri Puneet Jain, learned

counsel for the appellants is that the aforesaid document can

be looked into for the collateral purpose for deciding the

possession of the plaintiff. In this regard, Shri Jain, learned

counsel also relied upon the written statement wherein it is

mentioned that the cultivating possession of the plaintiff is

admitted. No doubt, this one sentence in the written statement

gives the impression that possession of the plaintiff is admitted,

but if we read the written statement as a whole we find that the

stand of the State is that the document is a sham document, at

best a mortgage deed and the possession of the plaintiff is in

the nature of a mortgagee.

8. One of the issues framed was whether the plaintiff had

become a cultivating farmer of the land in question and while

answering this issue the trial court has discussed the question

whether the plaintiff was in possession of the land or not. It

has been found that the plaintiff was not in possession of the

land. In fact, the plaintiff himself had admitted that he is not

in possession of the land and cultivation on his behalf is

carried out by a servant. It was also stated that one relative

was managing the cultivation of the land. The trial court held 8

that the plaintiff had failed to prove that he was in possession

because he failed to mention the name of the persons who were

owning the neighbouring lands nor could he give any details

thereof. The servant Buda and the relative Amlok Chand were

not examined by the plaintiff. Therefore, even as per the stand

of the plaintiff he was not in personal cultivating possession

and hence, he could not have got occupancy rights of a tenant

in the land which can only be given to a person who is actually

cultivating the land.

9. In view of the above discussion we find no error in the

judgment of the High Court and the appeal is dismissed

accordingly. Pending application(s), if any, stands disposed of.

….……………………..J. (MADAN B. LOKUR)

.….…………………….J. (DEEPAK GUPTA) New Delhi September 20, 2017