JUDGMENT

SHARMA, J. :- The civil appeals Nos. 1314-1318 of 1979 by certificate are directed against the decision of the Judicial Commissioner of Goa, Daman and Diu, declaring the Goa, Daman and Diu Agricultural Tenancy (5th Amendment) Act, 1976, as unconstitutional. The respondents are landlords in Goa. The lands were in possession of the tenants who were cultivating the same and paying rent to the respondents. The respondents were divested of their title in the lands by the provisions of the impugned Act which came in force in 1976 vesting the same in the tenants. The respondents filed five writ applications in the court of the Judicial Commissioner challenging the validity of the Amendment Act. The writ petitions were allowed by the impugned judgment. It has been held that the Act violates Articles 14 and 19 of the Constitution and the protection of Article 31 A is not available as the scheme of the Act does not constitute agrarian reform:

2. It has been contended on behalf of the respondent-writ petitioners that the landlords in Goa are generally small land-holders and their condition is not better than that of the tenants and in that view the Act divesting the landlords of their title in the land and vesting the same in the tenants suffers from the vice of illegal discrimination. A similar Act was earlier passed by the Maharashtra Legislature also which has been found to be constitutionally valid. The writ petitioners have, before the court below, successfully argued that the decision in that case is not applicable inasmuch as the Maharashtra Act contains provisions fixing ceiling to which the other provisions are subject to, while there is no such restriction in the present Act. The result is that although the Maharashtra Act had to be upheld as a measure of agrarian reform and thus protected by Article 31A of the Constitution, the present Act cannot be so interpreted.

3. During the pendency of these appeals the impugned Amendment Act along with the main Act were included in the 9th Schedule of the Constitution and the assent of the President was received on the 26th of August, 1984. Smt. Lakshmibai Narayan Patil, the writ petitioner in the three of the cases in the court of Judicial Commissioner (respondent in Civil Appeals Nos. 1314, 1315 and 1316 of 1979) has challenged the constitutional amendment as illegal and ultra vires by filing an application under Article 32 of the Constitution which has been numbered as Writ Petition No. 864 of 1988.

4. By the impugned Amendment Act, Chapter IIA has been included in the Goa, Daman and Diu Agricultural Tenancy Act, 1964 (hereinafter referred to as the Act), Chapter III has been deleted and some consequential changes have been made in some other sections. Chapter IIA deals with "special rights and privileges of tenants" as indicated by the heading. Broadly speaking, by the provisions of S. 18A of this Chapter the land belonging to a landlord not in his cultivating possession on the tillers day gets transferred to the tenant-in-possession for a price to be paid to the landlord. The expression tenant has been given a larger meaning under the Act by S. 4. By the second proviso of S. 4 a sub-tenant cultivating any land on or after 1-7-1962 has to be deemed to be a lawfully cultivating tenant notwithstanding the fact that the creation of sub-tenancy might have been prohibited by any law, and the tenant prior to the creation of the sub-tenancy (who may be referred to as intermediary tenant) is not to be treated as a tenant. The price of the land in question has to be determined and the payment made in accordance with the provisions of Chapter IIA. Separate provisions have been made with respect to special cases where tenant is a minor or has been evicted by the landlord before the tillers day. The provisions of S. 18-J provide for the resumption and disposal of the land not purchased by the tenant by reason of the purchase being ineffective under S. 18C or S. 18H or due to the failure of