important point
High Court may interfere with the findings of fact arrived at by the court below only if the findings are based on no evidence or based on conjectures or surmises and if no reasonable man would on given facts and circumstances come to those conclusions.

order

1.This appeal is preferred against a judgment and order dated 13th of October, 1998 of the High Court of Judicature for Andhra Pradesh at Hyderabad in W.P. No. 6452 of 1995, whereby the Division Bench of the High Court had allowed the Writ Petition filed by the respondents and set aside the order dated 9th of June, 1994 passed by the Special Court under the Andhra Pradesh Land Grabbing (Prohibition) Act, 1982 at Hyderabad (for short “the Special Court”).

2.The only question that needs to be decided in this appeal is, “Can the High Court, in the exercise of its jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution, set aside a finding of fact arrived at by the Special Court, under the Andhra Pradesh Land Grabbing (Prohibition) Act, 1982 (for short “the Act”) when such finding of fact of the Special Court was made on consideration of the evidence on record and could not be said to be perverse or arbitrary.?”

3.Briefly stated, the facts leading to the filing of this appeal are that the appellant, the State of Andhra Pradesh, filed an application under the Act against the respondents in the Special Court alleging, inter alia, that the 1st respondent was in occupation of 470 sq. yards of land in Ward No. 5, Block No. 1, Vijaywada out of which 220 sq. yards situated in N.T.S. No. 26 correlated to old N.T.S. No. 17/1-A/1-A of Vijaywada town (for short the “Schedule Land”) was by way of illegal encroachment. The appellant further complained that the 2nd and 3rd respondents, being the heirs and legal representatives of the original respondent No. 2, were in occupation of 540 sq. yards of land, out of which 190 sq. yards also situated in N.T.S. No. 26 correlated to old N.T.S. No. 17/1-A/1-A of Vijaywada town (for short “the schedule land”) was by way of illegal encroachment. Accordingly, the State of Andhra Pradesh, the appellant, had prayed for a declaration that the respondents were land grabbers within the meaning of the Act and that the appellant was the owner of the Schedule Land.

4.The respondents, in their objection, denied that they were land grabbers in respect of the Schedule Land and pleaded that their predecessors-in-interest had perfected title of the land by way of adverse possession and alternatively, according to them, the Schedule Land belonged to Gandhi Hill Society and therefore, the question of grabbing the land of the appellant by the respondents did not arise at all. Accordingly, they pleaded that the application under the Act filed by the State of A.P. must be rejected.

5. The parties went into trial and they were permitted to adduce evidence in support of their respective cases.

6.The Special Court before which the application for land grabbing was filed by the appellant, after considering the oral and documentary evidence on record, held that the respondents were land grabbers within the meaning of the Act. The Special Court also held, on consideration of the materials on record and evidence adduced by the parties, that the respondents had failed to prove that they had perfected the title in respect of the Schedule Land by way of adverse possession. It was also held on consideration of the evidence on record that the respondents had failed to prove that the Schedule Land belonged to Gandhi Hill Society. However, the Special Court, after finding that the respondents had done construction on the Schedule Land, granted liberty to the respondents to pay the market value of the Schedule Land grabbed by them so that the title of the same could be perfected by them. Accordingly, the Special Court directed the 1st respondent to pay Rs. 4,40,000/- and the 2nd and 3rd respondents to pay Rs. 3,80,000/- by 12 monthly installments to the appellant.

7.Feeling aggrieved by the order of the Special Court, the respondents filed a Writ Petition under Article 226 of the Constitution, which was allowed, as noted herein earlier, and the order of the Special Court was set aside.

8.For proper disposal of this appeal, therefore, it w