( 1 ) THESE writ petitions raise among others, one and common important question of law of interpretation and impact of Section 20 of urban land ceiling ACT and particularly the question in the context of the facts of the case that if the owner of the land holding land in excess of ceiling area or ceiling limits when applies under Section 20 of the Urban Land Ceiling Act, 1976, hereinafter referred to as the act, whether it is incumbent upon the government or state to dispose of those applications at the earliest and in every case before the stage of publication and service of draft statement under Section 8 (3) of the ACT and disposal of objection under Section 8 (4) and if it has not done so, what is the effect. If the answer to these questions goes in favour of the petitioners, then there may not be any necessity to go on other questions on merits of the case involved in these writ petitions, because in that case, firstly the government may have to be directed to dispose of applications under Section 20 and thereafter the authorities may have to proceed under sections 8 and 9 and 10 onwards of the ACT of 1976. But if the answer is in negative and in favour of the state, then the question may arise for consideration of the matters on merits, no doubt in that case subsequent events may have to be taken note of including the taking over of the property of the petitioner namely the bangalore palace under the said ACT vires of which have been upheld by this court. In this view of the matter, I have heard the learned counsels for the parties at length.

( 2 ) I have heard Smt. Nalini chidambaram, senior advocate, Sri g. v. shantharaju, Sri r. n. naidu and Sri a. s. ramachandra rao, learned counsels for the petitioners and Sri r. Narasimha murthy, senior Advocate assisted by Sri m. h. ibrahim, learned government pleader and Sri n. n. harish, learned counsel.

( 3 ) THESE writ petitions arise from the common judgment and Order dated 11-5-1992 delivered by the chairman of the Karnataka appellate tribunal in appeal nos. 93, 94, 95, 96, 97, 101, 106 and 107 all of 1989 dismissing all the appeals and affirming the common Order passed by the additional special deputy commissioner and competent authority, urban land ceiling, bangalore dated 27-7-1989 in case No. Ulc (a) (2)440 of 1985-86 which was impugned and challenged in the appeals as well as in writ petition No. 5076 of 1991.

( 4 ) THE petitioners of the above writ petitions in their individual capacity filed the statement as prescribed and required for the excess vacant land under Section 6 (1) of the act. There has been no doubt about the declarations being filed by all these petitioners. The petitioners were treated as declarant nos. 1 to 8 by the special deputy commissioner. The special deputy commissioner under Section 7 (2) was declared to be the competent authority for these cases. As mentioned in the appellate judgment, the property of mysore i. e. , properties comprising of various items were incorporated in the statement under Section 6 (1) of the ACT by Sri srikantadatta narasimharaja wadeyar, petitioner in writ petition No. 19793 of 1992. The appellants in other appeals i. e. , other petitioners have also filed the statement of declaration under Section 6 of the act. After filing of statement under Section 6 (1) of the act, the special deputy commissioner i. e. , the competent authority prepared a draft statement of excess vacant land provisionally and served the notices under Section 8 (1) (2) of the act. That all the petitioners (except the petitioners in writ petition nos. 5076 of 1991, 23725 of 1992, 23460 of 1992, 25266 of 1992 and 25265 of 1992) were given notices. I have mentioned some as exception as the petitioners' case in these writ petitions above referred as exception no notice under Section 8 was issued to the petitioners as per their allegation in their writ petitions which allegations have not been controverted by any counter-affidavit. Amo