Karnataka High Court: S. Sunil Dutt Yadav, J. allowed this writ petition which was preferred to set aside the order of the Deputy Commissioner.
The facts of the case are that the petitioner claimed to be the legal heir of the original grantee while claiming the land, granted in favour of his grandfather on 15-07-1935 and the evidence for this lies in the extract of Saguvali Chit Register. The land was sold on multiple occasions. The respondent claimed to be the purchaser on the last occasion under the sale deed dated 11-04-1973. The Petitioner sought resumption and restoration claiming that the last sale deed was executed within the non-alienation/prohibition period of twenty years. The Writ Petition was filed about nine years later from the order of the Deputy Commissioner. Poverty and ignorance were stated to be the reason for such a delay by the petitioner.
The Petitioner contended that in the period between the last sale and the present writ petition there had been no sale transaction and no third party rights created. The petitioner further contended that the same relief should be given as granted to the parties who have approached the authority well beyond the reasonable time.
Counsel for respondent S.S. Naganand contended that the petitioner has crossed the reasonable time for a writ petition to be maintainable while placing on record the cases – Nekkanti Rama Lakshmi v. State of Karnataka, 2017 SCC OnLine SC 1862 and Vivek M. Hinduja v. M. Ashwatha, 2017 SCC OnLine SC 1858.
Therefore, the Court held that being ignorant and poor are not sufficient reasons for looking into the reasonableness of delay at all. In these nine years, the respondent had also applied for the conversion of the land from agricultural to non-agricultural purpose. Thus, the writ petition was dismissed and the order of the Deputy Commissioner stood confirmed.[Muniyappa v. Special Deputy Commr., Bengaluru, 2019 SCC OnLine Kar 678, decided on 07-06-2019]
