This writ petition, originally filed by Madamaneni Chinnaswamy, raised the issue of legality and validity of orders dated 10.11.1995, 16.06.2000 and 16.05.2001 passed by respondent No.2, the Revenue Divisional Officer, Chittoor and respondent No.1 respectively. The petitioner having died, pending the writ petition, petitioner Nos.2 to 8 were brought on record as his legal representatives. For convenience, the deceased original writ petitioner is hereinafter referred to as the petitioner.

The petitioner purchased an extent of Ac.0.63 cents in Sy.No.128/E of Govindareddipalle Village, Thavanampalle Mandal, Chittoor District under registered sale deed dated 06.11.1967 from Sri Venkatswamy, Rajamma, Govindaswamy and Gangulaiah. He also purchased another extent of Ac.2.18 cents in Sy.No.129/2 of the same village under registered sale deed dated 26.11.1974. While he had been in possession and enjoyment of the said lands, respondent Nos.3 to 6 approached respondent No.1 with representation dated 11.09.1995, which was evidently forwarded by respondent No.1 to respondent No.2 for taking action on the said representation. By the said representation, respondent Nos.3 to 6 sought for restoration of possession of the said lands on the ground that the same were originally assigned to their grandfather late M.Gangulaiah and that they were in possession of the petitioner. It appears, respondent No.2 issued a notice to the petitioner calling for his explanation and in response thereto, the petitioner submitted his explanation. By order dated 10.11.1995, respondent No.2 held that the petitioner and his family members are financially sound and they are having Ac.8.38 cents jointly apart from three members of his family being salaried employees working in Central Government service and the sale transactions in favour of the petitioner are contrary to the provisions of Section 3(2) and (3) of the Andhra Pradesh Assigned Lands (Prohibition of Transfers) Act, 1977 (for short, 'the Act') and restored the lands to respondent Nos.3 to

6. The said order was questioned by the petitioner before the Revenue Divisional Officer. The petitioner specifically urged before the appellate authority that the property in question was purchased by him bona fide for consideration and falls within the exception contained in Section 3(5) of the Act. The appellate authority confirmed the order of respondent No.2 for the same reasons as were assigned by the latter. Respondent No.1, having followed suit by dismissing the revision petition filed by the petitioner, the present writ petition is filed calling in question these three orders.

Sri S.V. Muni Reddy, learned counsel for the petitioners urged that all the three authorities committed serious error in not considering the explanation offered by the petitioner and that on the admitted facts of the case, the petitioner was entitled to the benefit of Section 3(5) of the Act.

Learned Assistant Government Pleader for Revenue (Assignments) and Sri P.V. Vidyasagar, learned counsel representing respondent Nos.3 to 6 opposed the contentions of the learned counsel for the petitioners and submitted that the orders passed by the three authorities do not call for any interference. They further submitted that the petitioner failed to raise his specific pleas and prove that the ingredients of Section 3(5) of the Act are satisfied.

A perusal of the record shows that the petitioner filed his explanation to the show cause notice and the sum and substance of the said explanation is that he purchased the abovementioned properties under registered sale deeds for proper considerations from his own paternal uncle Gangulaiah and his other family members. While referring to the entire lands possessed by his family, the petitioner stated that his family consisted of four brothers, namely, Sri Chinnaswamy, Sri Mogulaiah, Sri M. Ponnuswamy and Sri M.Doraswamy. He also mentioned the names of Sri Devanand and Sri Dorai Raj, who are the sons o