Judgment:
ORDER
T.S. Sivagnanam, J.
1. The above Writ Petition has been filed challenging the order passed by The Tamil Nadu Land Reforms Special Appellate Tribunal dated 20.07.1998 in D. No. 401 of 1995.
2. The facts of the case are as follows:
(i) One S. Vasudevan, S/o Srinivasa Iyer of Manarkudi held an extent of 55.03 ordinary acres equivalent to 32.80 standard acres as on the crucial date 15.02.1970. Since the provisions of the Tamil Nadu Land Reforms (Fixation of Ceiling on land) Act 58 of 1961 as amended by Act 17 of 1970, hereinafter referred to as the Act, was attracted, proceedings were initiated under the Act. The holding of the land owner included the minor son's property to an extent of 18.33 ordinary acres equivalent to 14.11 standard acres. While calculating the holding of the land owner, the Authorized Officer excluded an extent of 18.33 ordinary acres, equivalent to 14.11 standard acres belonging to the minor son Narasimhan, who derived the property pursuant to a Deed of Partition, dated 18.04.1970 registered as Document No. 1078 of 1970. After excluding the said extent, the Authorized Officer declared an extent of 2.59 ordinary acres as 'surplus'. Draft statement was published on 05.07.1972 and final statement under Section 12 of the Act was published on 13.12.1972 and notification under Section 18(1) of the Act was published on 10.02.1973. The surplus declared was distributed to eligible persons in terms of the rules and compensation was also paid to the land owner.
(ii) The Deed of Partition, dated 18.04.1970 was entered into between S. Vasudevan and his wife Tmt. Anushammal, wherein certain lands, which were described in the Schedule 'B' to the said Deed of Partition were set apart in favour of an unborn child. The Department came to the conclusion that allotting an extent of land in favour of the unborn child was with the aim of escaping from the clutches of Act and to retain the said extent which was declared surplus. Further, the Department was of the opinion that the Authorized Officer who dealt with the case wrongly validated the Deed of Partition, without properly appreciating the scope of Section 21A of the Act. By stating that this error goes to the root of the matter, defeating the very purpose of the Act, the Department, represented by the Director of Land Reforms, Chennai, invoked the jurisdiction of the Special Appellate Tribunal and presented a petition to exercise its power under Section 83 of the Act and to set aside the notification issued under Section 10(1) of the Act, published in the Government Gazatte dated 05.07.1972, excluding the land to an extent of 18.33 ordinary acres, covered in the Deed of Partition, dated 18.04.1970, on the ground that an unintended benefit has been granted to the land owner by wrong application of Section 21A of the Act.
(iii) The Department in the said petition requested the Special Appellate Tribunal to invoke its suo-moto powers on the ground that the Deed of Partition, dated 18.04.1970 is solely intended to defeat the provisions of the Act and the order of the Authorized Officer is erroneous, since he failed to appreciate the true spirit of Section 21A and the reasons assigned by the Authorized Officer for validating the Deed of Partition are perverse. This petition which was presented by the Department was registered as D. No. 401 of 1995 on the file of Special Appellate Tribunal.
(iv) The son and the wife of the land owner filed a counter statement before the Special Appellate Tribunal, interalia contending that the petition is not maintainable, since, after the draft statement under Section 10(1) of the Act was published in the Gazatte on 05.07.1972, the final statement has been published on 13.12.1972 and thereafter notification under Section 18(1) of the Act has also been published on 10.07.1973 and the surplus has been acquired and after a lapse of 23 years, the present revision was filed before the Special Appellate Tribunal and under the Scheme of the Act, period of limitation has been prescribed for preferring an appeal under Section 78 as well as under Section 82 of the Act. Therefore, it was contended that the rights which vested with the land owner for over 23 years is now sought to be altered to their prejudice and such action should not be permitted.
(v) It was further contended that in the Deed of Partition, the unborn son was represented by the land owner's wife, who was the 2nd respondent before the Tribunal and the 2nd petitioner herein and she also joined in the execution of the deed. Further, it was submitted that the Deed of Partition was effected by a registered document and the land was allotted to Narasimhan, who continued to be in enjoyment of the same from the date of partition. Further, it was contended that the son was born on 22.05.1970 i.e. prior to 02.10.1970 and such partition effected between the said Narasimhan and his father would be valid and binding. It was further submitted that the suo-moto power of the Special Appellate Tribunal cannot be entertained after a lapse of 23 years and especially, when the legal position is that an unborn son could be given a part of estate and therefore the re-opening of the proceedings is wholly illegal.
3. Based on the above pleadings, the matter was taken up by the Special Appellate Tribunal and by order dated 20.07.1998, the Tribunal, after considering the factual and legal aspects held that the Tribunal's suo-moto power under Section 83 has been exercised by re-opening cases after a long delay when it is found necessary that the propriety or legality or correctness of any decision made has to be examined. Therefore, the Tribunal held that the delay in filing the case by itself cannot be a ground for throwing out the case at the initial stage. Further, the Tribunal observed that the fact, the proceedings have been completed long ago and the Government did not file an appeal or revision at an earlier stage, will be the factors to be taken into account along with the other factors, when a final decision is to be made.
4. The Tribunal further observed that at the threshold, the authorities have made out a case, that the Authorized Officer validated the Deed of Partition between the husband and wife, under which a portion of the property has been set apart in favour of an unborn child which is not allowed. Hence, the Tribunal felt that the matter requires scrutiny and instead of sending the case back to the Authorized Officer, the Tribunal itself shall finally decide the matter. Accordingly, the petition was held to be maintainable and direction was issued to number the case, to enable the Tribunal to continue the hearing on merits.
5. Aggrieved by the said order, dated 20.07.1998, the present Writ Petition has been filed.
6. The petitioners after reiterating the grounds raised before the Tribunal would contend that when the Tribunal is exercising powers under Section 83, it should consider whether there is sufficient and reasonable cause for condoning the delay in filing the revision petition and it is not open to the Tribunal to act beyond its power by overriding the prescribed period stipulated in the Act for filing an Appeal or Revision.
7. It was further contended that the Tribunal passed the impugned order condoning the delay without considering the mandatory period prescribed in the Act and without following the provisions prescribed in the Act for entertaining a Revision or Appeal filed beyond the period stipulated. The petitioners further contended that the Application ought to have been dismissed for non-compliance of the procedure as prescribed under Rule 29 (7) of the Rules. It was further contended that the Revision Petition had been filed only against the notification under Section 10(1) and subsequently, notifications under Sections 12 and 18(1) have been issued and the revision petition ought to have been rejected as not maintainable.
8. The respondents have filed a counter affidavit in which, after reiterating the factual aspects which were raised in the petition filed before the Special Appellate Tribunal in D. No. 401 of 1995, the respondents submitted that there is no period specified for invoking the power under Section 83 of the Act and the Tribunal has exercised its suo-moto power in several cases after a long delay, if it is satisfied that there is sufficient cause for re-opening the matter. Hence, it was contended that the order passed by the Tribunal calls for no interference.
9. We have heard the submissions made by Mr. K. Manoj Menon, the learned Counsel appearing for the petitioners and Mrs. Malarvizhi Udayakumar, the learned Special Government Pleader appearing for the respondents and carefully perused the materials available on record.
10. The grievance of the petitioner in the above Writ Petition is that the Tribunal ought not have entertained the petition filed by the Director of Land Reforms, seeking to invoke the power of the Tribunal under Section 83 of the Act after a long period of 23 years, after the proceedings initiated under the Act had attained finality. The learned Counsel would submit that the undue delay in making the petition is itself a good ground for dismissing the petition and the Hon'ble Supreme Court, in several cases has held that unless the delay is satisfactorily explained, the question of condoning the delay does not arise. It was further contended by the learned Counsel that considering the facts and circumstances of the case, the length of delay is an important circumstance, because, the rights which had accrued in favour of the petitioners is sought to be disturbed after a long period of 23 years. In support of his contention, the learned Counsel placed reliance on the following decisions:
(1) Aflatoon v. Lt. Governor, Delhi in : AIR 1974 Supreme Court 2077, where the Hon'ble Supreme Court was considering the Writ Petitions which questioned the validity of a proceeding under the Land Acquisition Act and in paragraph-11, of the said judgment the Hon'ble Supreme Court held that 'there is no reason as to why, the Writ Petitioners in the said case should have waited till 1972 for challenging the validity of the notification issued in 1959'. The Hon'ble Supreme Court further, observed that the petitioners have sat on the fence and allowed the Government to complete the acquisition proceedings and then they sought to attack the notification at belated stage and if allowed, it would be putting a premium on dilatory tactics.
(2) I.G.N. Sahakari Samiti v. State of Rajasthan : AIR 1974 Supreme Court 2085. In the said case, the Hon'ble Supreme Court was also dealing with the case under Rajasthan Land Acquisition Act and after following the decision in Aflatoon's case cited supra, held that in such cases the length of delay is an important circumstance because of the nature of acts done during the interval on the basis of the notification and the declaration.
(3) PT Giridharan Prasad Missir v. State of Bihar 1980 2 Scc 83, wherein the Hon'ble Supreme Court also dealing with the matter arising under the Land Acquisition Act, held that rejection of petition filed after 17 months was justified.
(4) R. Padmavathy v. The Land Commissioner (Land Records), Chennai : (2001) 3 M.L.J 1. In the said decision, the Division Bench of this Court while dealing with the power under Section 83 which came to be exercised by the Special Appellate Tribunal, when the identical matter was pending before the land Tribunal. Under such circumstances, the Division Bench held as follows:
9. In respect of D. No. 825 of 1993, however, the Tribunal has made observations that the order dated 1.2.1973 was patently wrong in the light of the provisions of Section 22 of the Act and the said order could not be sustained. Then Tribunal went on to discuss the question of delay, wherein it held, in exercise of the suo motu jurisdiction of the Tribunal, there was no time limit and therefore there was no injustice caused to the land owner since the appeal against the second order dated 18.11.1988 was pending and the Land Tribunal could go into all the arguments which can be put forward as regards that order. The Tribunal then observed as follows:
In these circumstances, to overcome the technical objection and in the interests of justice, I hereby set aside the orders of the Authorized Officer, Land Reforms, Trichy, in his proceedings MRI, 11BM (144 Per.)/17-70, dated 01.12.1973 under the suo motu powers vested in this Tribunal under Section 83 of this Act. Hence, D. No. 825/93 is allowed.The Land Tribunal thereafter has been requested to dispose of the appeal expeditiously. It is this order which is very heavily assailed by the learned Counsel in the present writ petition. Before approaching this Court, the petitioners had gone directly to the Supreme Court by way of a Special Leave Petition (S.L.P) wherein, a notice was issued. However, afterwards the said S.L.P. was withdrawn as it was held in L. Chandrakumar v. Union of India : (1997) 3 S.C.C. 261, a writ petition could be filed against the order of the Tribunal. The said S.L.P. was, therefore, withdrawn and the Court was approached in the present writ petition.
10. Learned Counsel urges that the Special Appellate Tribunal has acted without jurisdiction in entertaining a hopelessly time-barred revision and then setting aside in order and deciding an issue which precisely was pending before the Land Tribunal. It was pointed out by the learned Counsel that the very basis of the appeal pending before the Land Tribunal against the order dated 18.11.1988 was that in the wake of orders dated 01.12.1973, such order dated 18.11.1988 could not have been passed by the same Authority without there being any provisions of law. In fact, in the impugned order itself, there is a clear cut reference to the said Appeal in paragraph 2 (page 66):
In any case an appeal against the order of the Authorized Officer in 1983 is pending before the Land Tribunal. If the earlier order of 1973 is not set aside, it will lead to a technical objection that the Authorized Officer cannot review his own orders. The petitioner can put in all these arguments before the Land Tribunal before whom the appeal is pending.11. Now it is clear that the issue whether the subsequent order could be passed dated 18.11.1988 on the backdrop of the order dated 01.12.1973 was a substantial issue pending before the Land Tribunal. Under Such circumstances, the Special Appellate Tribunal could not have wiped out the order dated 01.12.1973 much less using the so called suo motu powers. WE are not able to understand the user of the suo motu powers by the Special Appellate Tribunal. In fact, what was filed before the Special Land Tribunal was nothing but a revision by the Director, Land Reforms. In order to get out of the difficulty of limitation, it is mentioned that the suo motu powers were being activated. What was filed before the Tribunal was, in fact, nothing but a revision under Section 83 of the Act. The Tribunal, therefore, could not have ignored the question of limitation as it did. But even if we can take the view, that the Special Appellate Tribunal could go into the merits and demerits of the revision, one fails to understand as to how the Tribunal could have straight away wiped out the order dated 01.12.1997 which order was fait accompli, which was finally passed against which there was no appeal or revision and which remained on the record till it was set aside by the Tribunal by the impugned order dated 28.04.1998. It is liable to be seen that the said order was referred to in the order dated 18.11.988 also and yet the order dated 18.11.1988 came to be passed. Taking a view that all the transactions entered into by Muthu Reddiar were hit by Section 22 of the Act and the land disposed of, had to be included in the holding of Muthu Reddiar.
12. We are not going to comment on the merits of the matter at all, for the simple reason that a proper appeal is pending against the order dated 18.11.1988. In that appeal, all the questions would be open including the proprietary of that order as also whether the same could have been passed in the wake of there already being one order dated 01.12.1973 in which the question of surplus lands held by the petitioner was considered. In our opinion, the Special Land Tribunal could not have simply set aside the order dated 01.12.1973 and wiped it out of the record, so as to show that the order dated 18.11.1988 was a fresh order passed for the first time by an Authority under Section 10 of the Act. All these questions which are pending before the Land Tribunal should have been allowed to be decided by the Land Tribunal itself. We therefore feel that in the interest of justice, it would not be proper to allow the order of the Special Appellate Tribunal to be sustained. Instead we will set aside that order holding that the said order is sans proprietary in law. The Tribunal erred in law in activating its suo motu powers under Section 83 in particular and decide the precise question which was pending before the Land Tribunal. In our opinion, the suo motu powers cannot be sued to pre-empt a particular question and to bye-pass a decision which is legally due from the other Tribunal. In fact, the Special Appellate Tribunal has also given all the findings regarding the correctness or otherwise of the validity of the transactions by Muthu Reddiar. The proprietary demanded that the Special Appellate Tribunal should not have entered not those questions, particularly when the matter was pending in an appeal before the Land Tribunal, much less such expression should not have me in a revisional and that too suo motu revisional jurisdiction.
(5) F.M. Devaru Ganapati Bhat v. Prabhakkar Ganapathi Bhat (2004) 1 M.L.J. 180 (S.C.). The issue before the Hon'ble Supreme Court related to a matter arising under the Transfer of Property Act, where a point relating to creation of interest in favour of an unborn child was considered. The Hon'ble Supreme Court held that there is no ban on the transfer of interest in favour of an unborn person and Section 20 of the Transfer of Property Act permits an interest being created for the benefit of an unborn person who acquires interest upon his birth.
By relying on the above judgment, the learned Counsel would submit that the order passed by Special Appellate Tribunal has to be set aside.
11. The learned Special Government Pleader Mrs. Malarvizhi Udayakumar, after reiterating the averments in the counter affidavit would submit that the order passed by the Tribunal is legal and proper and the power under Section 83 of the Act could be invoked so that the Tribunal could satisfy itself as to the regularity in proceedings or correctness, legality of any decision or order made under the Act, if in the opinion of the Tribunal such decision or order should be modified, annulled, reversed or remitted for reconsideration.
12. The learned Special Government Pleader contended that the Special Appellate Tribunal considering the issue raised and bearing in mind the object of the enactment, decided to hear the matter itself without remanding the matter to the Authorized Officer. Therefore, the learned Counsel submitted that there is no error in the order passed by the Tribunal.
13. The learned Special Government Pleader placed reliance on the decision of the Hon'ble Supreme Court in N. Balakrishnan v. M. Krishnamurthy reported in : (1998) 7 Supreme Court Cases 123 and would submit that the condonation of delay is a matter of discretion of the Court and length of delay is not a matter and acceptability of the explanation is the only criteria. The learned Counsel would next submit, by relying on the decision of the Hon'ble Supreme Court in State of Haryana v. Chandra Mani reported in : (1996) 3 Supreme Court Cases 132, that the sufficient cause for the delay should be considered with pragmatism in justice oriented manner.
14. The learned Special Government Pleader placed reliance on Collector, Land Acquisition, Anantnag v. Mst. Katiji reported in : (1987) 2 Supreme Court Cases 107 and held that liberal approach is to be adopted in the matter of condonation of delay and by applying the ratio of the said judgment, the delay could be condoned.
15. The only issue arises for consideration in the present Writ Petition is as to whether the Special Appellate Tribunal was right in invoking its jurisdiction under Section 83 of the Act for the purpose of examining as to whether there has been any illegality or impropriety or incorrectness in the order passed by the Authorized Officer. Before proceeding to considering the facts of the case and various contentions raised, it is useful to examine the power accorded to the Tribunal under Section 83 which reads as follows:
83. Revision by Special Appellate Tribunal - (1) The Special Appellate Tribunal may of its own motion or on application, call for and examine the record of the Authorized Officer, the Land Board, the Land Commissioner or the Land Tribunal in respect of any proceeding under this Act to satisfy itself as to the regularity of such proceeding or the correctness or legality or propriety of any decision passed or order made therein, and if, in any case it appears to the Special Appellate Tribunal that any such decision or order should be modified, annulled, reversed or remitted for reconsideration, it may pass orders accordingly:
Provided that every application to the Special Appellate Tribunal for the exercise of the powers under this section shall be preferred within such period as may be prescribed:
Provided further that the Special Appellate Tribunal may admit an application after the expiration of prescribed period if it is satisfied that the party concerned has sufficient cause for not presenting it within such period:
Provided also that this section shall not apply to any proceeding of the Land Tribunal in respect of which appeal lies under Section 79 to the Special Appellate Tribunal.
(2) No order prejudicial to any person shall be passed under Sub-section (1), unless such person has been given an opportunity of making his representations.
Amendments - Section 83 substituted by Act 3 of 1984. In Sub-section (1), the words 'the authorized officer, the Land Board' substituted by Act 57 of 1986.
Thus it could be seen from the language of the provisions that the powers of the Special Appellate Tribunal are very wide to examine the correctness or legality of any of the proceedings under the Act so as to satisfy itself as to the regularity of such proceedings and the Special Appellate Tribunal is entitled to pass orders either modifying or annulling or reversing or remitting the matter for reconsideration.
16. As stated by learned Special Government Pleader, there is no period of limitation prescribed under the rules for invocation of the said powers by the Special Appellate Tribunal. In reply to the said contention, the learned Counsel for the writ petitioners, would submit that by going through the provisions of the Act, more particularly Sections 79 and 82, limitations have been prescribed for filing an Appeal to the Special Appellate Tribunal and a Revision to the Land Commissioner under Section 80. However, in terms of Section 80 of the Act, the provisions of the Limitations Act was applicable to an appeal under Sections 78 or 79. Therefore, the learned Counsel would submit that such power could be exercised within a reasonable time and in the instant case, 23 years cannot be considered as a reasonable time for the invocation of the said power.
17. By placing reliance on the Judgments cited supra, the learned Counsel had contended that Hon'ble Supreme Court had upheld the decision of the High Court, when an Application challenging the Land Acquisition Proceedings was made after 17 months. However, in the instant case, the said issue is sought to be re-opened after an inordinate delay of 23 years and there is absolutely no explanation for having invoked the said power at this point of time.
18. It is true that the Hon'ble Supreme Court has rejected the petitions challenging the validity of Land Acquisition Proceedings, which were belatedly filed and in the case of Aflatoon, a petition filed after a period of 13 years was rejected, as it was held that, if the petition is allowed to be entertained, it would be putting a premium on dilatory tactics. Therefore, the law laid down by the Hon'ble Supreme Court is that, undue delay in making a petition is sufficient ground to reject the petition at the threshold.
19. The Hon'ble Supreme Court in Collector, Land Acquisition, Anantnag v. Mst. Katiji : (1987) 2 Supreme Court Cases 107, referred to supra has also considered the question, whether to condone or not to condone or considering the question whether or not to apply the standard in applying the 'sufficient cause' test to all the litigants regardless of their personality. The Hon'ble Supreme Court after analyzing the power conferred under Section 5 of the Limitations Act, held that liberal approach is to be adopted and the Hon'ble Supreme Court laid down six principles:
3. The legislature has conferred the power to condone delay by enacting Section 5 of the Indian Limitation Act of 1963 in order to enable the courts to do substantial justice to parties by disposing of matters on 'merits'. The expression 'sufficient cause' employed by the legislature is adequately elastic to enable the Courts to apply the law in a meaningful manner which subserves the ends of justice that being the life purpose for the existence of the institution of Courts. It is common knowledge that this Court has been making a justifiably liberal approach in matters instituted in this Court. But the message does not appear to have percolated down to all the other Courts in the hierarchy. And such a liberal approach is adopted on principle as it is realized that:
1. Ordinarily a litigant does not stand to benefit by lodging an appeal late.
2. Refusing to condone delay can result in a meritorious matter being thrown out at the very threshold and cause of justice being defeated. As against this when delay is condoned the highest that can happen is that a cause would be decided on merits after hearing the parties.
3.'Every day's delay must be explained' does not mean that a pedantic approach should be made. Why not every hour's delay, every second's delay? The doctrine must be applied in a rational common sense pragmatic manner.
4. When substantial justice and technical considerations are pitted against each other, cause of substantial justice deserves to be preferred for the other side cannot claim to have vested right in injustice being done because of a non-deliberate delay.
5. There is no presumption that delay is occasioned deliberately, or on account of culpable negligence, or on account of mala fides. A litigant does not stand to benefit by resorting to delay. In fact he runs a serious risk.
6. It must be grasped that judiciary is respected not on account of its power to legalize injustice on technical grounds but because it is capable of removing injustice and is expected to do so.
Therefore, in the said case, the Hon'ble Supreme Court held that in making a justice oriented approach, there was sufficient cause for condoning the delay in instituting the appeal.
20. The Hon'ble Supreme Court, time and again held that the words 'sufficient cause' should be considered liberally and acceptability of the explanation for the delay is the sole criteria and length of delay is not relevant. Further, it was also held that the matter has to be decided on case to case basis, depending on facts and circumstances of each case.
21. The Hon'ble Supreme Court in : (1979) 3 Supreme Court Cases 466 (Authorised Officer, Thanjavur and Anr. v. S. Naganatha Ayyar and Ors.) was considering the scope and construction of 1961 Act. The Hon'ble Supreme Court has held as follows:
7. When a whole legislation is geared to deprivation of property, subject to payment of compensation, rules which have frowned upon confiscatory legislation cannot apply at all. We are concerned with a Republic created by the people of India, with a social transformation where the State is not antagonistic to the citizen but harmonises individual interest with community good. The jurispridential principles in such a situation cannot be the same as have been inherited from a culture which postulates the State v. The subject. We do not explore the aspect of the law further as we are satisfied that the answer to the specific question raised before us flows directly from a reading of the Section in the light of well-established rules of interpretation.
14. Moreover, when the whole purpose of the section is to prevent any alienation which defeats any of the provisions of the Act, it is impermissible to introduce any requirement, other than is mentioned in the Section, as a condition for its operation. Obviously, the provision seeks to provide social justice for the landless and it defeats the purpose if, by the interpretative process, soft justice to large landholders is brought about. We consider the 'literal' meaning of the section to be that any transfer of other alienation mentioned in the section which reduces or impairs the otherwise available extent of surplus land beyond the ceiling 'defeats...the provisions of this Act.' This is the plain meaning of the Section which give no room for doubt or justification for importation of any further condition like sham, bogus, etc.
16. In the interpretation of Section 22 we too are Portia me. For this reason we reverse the view of the High Court that Section 22 will not apply nullify any transaction of transfer or partition unless it is further shown that it is sham, nominal or bogus. Nor do we agree with Shree Ramamurthi that even if a transaction defeats the ceiling provisions, it may still be valid if the transfer is, from an individual point of view bona fide. The short reply is that from the community's angel, especially the landless community's angle hungering for allotment, the alienation, however necessary for the individual, is not bona fide vis-a-vis the community.
From the above judgment of the Hon'ble Supreme Court, it is clear that the object behind enacting the Land Reforms Act was to secure the ownership and control of the material resources of the community and to ensure that they are distributed to subserve the common good and the operation of the economic system does not result in the concentration of wealth and means of production to the common detriment. The Act was enacted to ensure that the distribution of the land will best subserve the common good, increase the agricultural production and protect justice, social and economic.
22. Thus, bearing in mind the object of the enactment, we feel that the normal interpretation given in matters relating to land acquisition proceedings or service matters or challenge as regards validity of an enactment cannot be applied to the facts and circumstances of this case, which arose under the provisions of the Land Reforms Act. On a careful reading of the impugned order passed by the Special Appellate Tribunal, it is to be noted that the Tribunal did not come to any specific conclusion on merits. It came to a conclusion that at the threshold, the Department has made out a case that the authorities have acted upon the Partition Deed between the husband and wife wherein a property has been set apart for an unborn son. Therefore, the Special Appellate Tribunal came to a conclusion that the propriety or legality of the order of the Authorized Officer validating such Deed of Partition under Section 21 A is justified or not has to be examined. Further, the Special Appellate Tribunal was conscious of the fact that the proceedings had concluded long back and no Appeal or Revision had been filed against the notification issued at various stages. However, bearing in mind the object of the Act, the Special Appellate Tribunal itself decided to take up the matter and hear the case, instead of remanding the matter back to the Authorized Officer. Therefore, in our view, the decisions cited by the learned Counsel for the writ petitioners cannot be applied to the facts and circumstances of the present case arising under the Land Reforms Act and more so, considering the scope of the direction issued by the Special Appellate Tribunal.
23. The Hon'ble Supreme Court in Collector, Land Acquisition, Anantnag v. Mst. Katiji : (1987) 2 Supreme Court Cases 107, had held that there should be liberal approach and the approach should be justice-oriented and refusing to condone the delay can result in a meritorious matter being thrown out at the very threshold and cause of justice being defeated. The Hon'ble Supreme Court in State of Haryana v. Chandramani reported in : (1996) 3 Supreme Court Cases 132 referred supra while considering the issue related to 'sufficient cause' had observed in paragraph-11 which reads as follows:
The expression 'sufficient cause' should, therefore, be considered with pragmatism in justice-oriented approach rather than the technical detection of sufficient cause for explaining every day's delay. The factors which are peculiar to and characteristic of the functioning of the governmental conditions would be cognizant to and requires adoption of pragmatic approach in justice-oriented process. The Court should decide the matters on merits unless the case is hopelessly without merit. No separate standards to determine the cause laid by the State vis-a-vis private litigant could be laid to prove strict standards of sufficient cause. Litigants including the State are accorded the same treatment and the law is administered in an even-handed manner.
The Government at appropriate level should constitute legal cells to examine the cases whether any legal principles are involved for decision by the Courts or whether cases require adjustment and should authorize the officers to take a decision or give appropriate permission for settlement. In the event of decision to file appeal the needed prompt action should be pursued by the officer responsible to file the appeal and he should be made personally responsible for lapses, if any. Equally, the State cannot be put on the same footing as an individual.
24. Thus, by applying the law laid down by the Hon'ble Supreme Court, it is to be noted that considering the facts and circumstances of the present case, the matter cannot be thrown at the threshold and there should be an opportunity to examine the correctness of the issue as to whether the setting up of an extent of property in favour of an unborn child is valid, and as to whether such document was intended to defeat the provisions of the Act. As we are satisfied that the matter cannot be thrown out at the threshold, we hold that in the facts and circumstances of the present case, the Special Appellate Tribunal was justified in deciding to hear the matter on merits, rather to reject the matter on the ground of delay. However, we refrain from deciding the issue as to whether the Authorized Officer was justified in validating the Deed of Partition under Section 21 A of the Act as it has to be decided by examining oral and documentary evidence after hearing the parties.
25. In view of the above, we hold that the impugned order is legal and valid and does not call for any interference and the Writ Petition is liable to be dismissed.
26. The Special Appellate Tribunal in the penultimate paragraph of the order observed that the Tribunal itself would decide the matter on merits. Since the Tribunal is no longer functioning, it would be appropriate for the 2nd respondent, namely, the Director of Land Reforms, Chennai-5, to hear the matter after issuing notice to the petitioners and the 3rd respondent and pass orders in accordance with law and on merits. As observed by the Tribunal, it would be open to the petitioner to raise before the 2nd respondent that the proceedings have been completed long ago and the Government did not file any Appeal or Revision at an earlier stage, against the notifications issued under Sections 12 and 18 of the Act and if the said question is raised, the 2nd respondent shall also decide on the same on merits and in accordance with law.
With the above observations, the Writ Petition is dismissed. However, there will be no order as to costs.