The court upheld the Gujarat Revenue Tribunal's decision, emphasizing that the petitioners failed to provide sufficient cause for a 31-year delay in challenging the surplus land declaration.

JUDGMENT :

NIKHIL S. KARIEL, J.

1. Heard learned advocate Mr. Gaurang Vaghela for the petitioners and learned AGP Mr. Jayneel Parikh for the respondent State Authorities. Since all the petitions are interconnected, they are being decided by the present common judgment.

2. At the outset, it would be profitable to have an overall conspectus of the facts in its entirety before dealing with individual petitions. It appears that the family of the petitioners had held agricultural lands in village: Masma, Ta. Oldpad, Dist. Surat, and whereas originally Ceiling Act Case No.1852 of 1977, had been initiated by the Mamlatdar and ALT, Choryasi, Dist. Surat, under the provisions of the Gujarat Agriculture Land Ceiling Act, 1960 (herein after to be referred to as “the Act”) against the mother of the petitioners and whereas vide an order dated 20.01.1981, lands admeasuring 4A. and 30G. were declared surplus from the land held by the petitioners. It appears that the said order had been challenged by mother of the petitioners before the Deputy Collector, Olpad, by preferring Ceiling Revision Case No.86 of 1981 and whereas vide order dated 22.10.1981, the Deputy Collector had quashed the order by the Mamaltdar and ALT and remanded the matter back to the State Authorities. It appears that in remand proceedings, the Mamlatdar & ALT vide an order dated 25.03.1982, had declared that there is no excess land in the holding of the petitioner family. It appears that the said order passed by the Mamaltdar and ALT, had been taken for statutory review before the Deputy Collector and whereas the order dated 25.03.1982 had been set aside and vide order dated 15.01.1983, the Deputy Collector had once again remanded the matter back to the Mamlatdar and ALT.

3. In the remand proceedings, the Mamlatdar and ALT had declared 14A. and 4G. as being excess land held by the family of the petitioners vide order dated 06.12.1986. It requires to be mentioned here that the order dated 06.12.1986 is the principal order and while this Court is hearing a group of five petitions preferred by the very selfsame petitioners, where different orders passed by the Gujarat Revenue Tribunal are under challenge, yet it requires to be mentioned that all the five petitions in one way or other way emanates from the order dated 06.12.1986 passed in Ceiling Case No.1852/1977.

4. It appears that the said order dated 06.12.1986 had been challenged by the petitioners through their Power of Attorney before the Deputy Collector, Olpad, vide Ceiling Appeal No.47/1987 and vide order dated 13.08.1987, the Deputy Collector, Olpad, had rejected the challenge against the order dated 06.12.1986 by the Mamlatdar and ALT.

At this stage, it requires to mention that order dated 13.08.1987 had been challenged by the petitioners before the learned Gujarat Revenue Tribunal by preferring Revision Application No.TEN/BS/13/2018, which Revision Application had been rejected by the learned GRT vide order dated 01.05.2024, which order is impugned in the Special Civil Application No.12816 of 2024.

5. At this stage, it also requires to be mentioned that in the interregnum from 1987 to 2018, the petitioners had taken out various proceedings including independently challenging order dated 06.12.1986 by the Mamlatdar and ALT before the Deputy Collector, which was rejected vide order dated 15.07.2011.

Later the Deputy Collector, Olpad, had vide order dated 30.08.2012 allotted the land declared as excess as per the scheme of the Act and the same had been challenged by the petitioners preferring three separate Revision Applications before the learned GRT, which Revision Applications being Revision Application Nos.46, 47 and 48 of 2012 had been rejected by order dated 04.10.2012 by the learned GRT. It also appears that Review Applications had been preferred against all three orders being TEN/CS/4, 5 & 6/2018 and whereas vide order dated 26.03.2024, the three Review Applications preferred in orders dated 04.10.2012 confirm