The appellate authority has the inherent power to order remand, but this power should be exercised in accordance with well-established principles of law. A remand for fresh evidence can only be ordered in exceptional circumstances, such as where there has been no proper or regular trial and prejudice has been caused.

( 1 ) THIS writ petition came up for hearing before a single Judge, who has by order dated 16th April, 1964 referred it to a larger Bench for decision.

( 2 ) THE writ is directed against the order of the Additional District Judge, dated 3rd February, 1966, by which he has on appeal set aside the order of the Estate Officer, dated 6th April, 1965 passed under the Public Premises (Eviction of Unauthorised Occupants) Act for eviction of the petitioner from the land in dispute, and remanded the case to the Estate Officer.

( 3 ) THE land in dispute is a small strip of land situated outside the Shiv Temple in Nizamuddin. The land was claimed by the Land and Development Officer as belonging to the Government and the possession of the petitioner was alleged to be unauthorised. Proceedings for his eviction were initiated by the Estate Officer. On behalf of the Government reliance was placed on a lease deed granted by the Government to Sanatan Dharam Sabha. There was some dispute about the area of the land involved in the case. The Government claimed the area to be 15 x 15 , while the petitioner submitted that he was in possession of a much larger area of 40 x 22 . The contention of the petitioner was that the land did not belong to the Government, but was under the control of the Delhi Pracheenpanchayat Halwain. On behalf of the Government were produced only two documents, namely, the lease deed Ex. A1. , and the site plan Ex. A8. It is significant to add that no request was made by the Government for an opportunity to produce any further evidence. On behalf of the petitioner oral evidence was produced. On this material, the Estate Officer came to the conclusion that the petitioner was in unauthorised occupation of the premises and, therefore, ordered his eviction.

( 4 ) FEELING aggrieved, the petitioner filed an apppeal under section 9 of the aforesaid Act. The appeal was heard by the Additional District Judge. He held that the lease deed (A) executed in 1940 by the Government in favour of the Sanatan Dharam Sabha did not constitute sufficient evidence to establish the title of the Government with regard to the land in dispute and no other evidence existed on the file to show that the land in dispute constituted public premises as defined by the Act. The learned Judge further observed that in order to get the petitioner before us evicted from the premises, it was imperative on the part of the Government to establish that the disputed property was covered by the term public premises as defined in the Act, and in the opinion of the learned Additional District Judge the Government had failed in this behalf in a miserable manner. The learned Judge further observed that the Estate Officer while ordering the eviction did not apply his mind to find out in a conclusive manner as to whether the Government had any title in the suit property or not. As a result he allowed the appeal and set aside the order of the Estate Officer, but remanded the case to him with the direction to take fresh evidence from both the parties and decide the matter on merits.

( 5 ) THIS order of remand has been assailed by the petitioner in this writ petition. Mr. Madan Bhatia, learned counsel for the petitioner has raised three contentions, namely (1) The Additional District Judge acting as the appellate Officer under the Act was a persona designata and not a court : (2) The appellate Officer did not have any inherent power to order remand of the case to the Estate Officer ; and (3) In any view of the matter no remand could legally be ordered for production of fresh evidence and fresh trial and so the remand order must be quashed.

( 6 ) WITH regard to the second contention, Mr. Bhatia has submitted that section 9 (4) of the Act provides that every appeal under the section shall be disposed of by the appellate Officer as expeditiously as possible and the procedure prescribed by statutory rule 9 deals with the filing of the memorandum of appeal acc