The sale, gift or bequest by a khatedar tenants of his interest in the whole or part of his holding shall be void, if such sale, gift or bequest is by a number of Scheduled Caste in favour of a person who is not a member of the Scheduled Caste, or by a member of a Scheduled Tribe in favour of a person who in not a member of the Scheduled Tribe.

Ajay Rastogi, J.

1. Instant special appeals have been filed against the self same judgment of the ld. Single Judge dt. 10.04.2007. The moot question arose for consideration before the ld. Single Judge was –

"Whether the Land Development Bank is competent to auction/sell the land mortgaged to it by its loanee, who is a member of Scheduled Caste/Scheduled Tribe, in open auction to a person who is not a member of Scheduled Caste/Scheduled Tribe in contravention of Sec. 42 of the Rajasthan Tenancy Act, 1955 (in short 'the Act, 1955'), which prohibits the sale, gift or bequest of a land belonging to Scheduled Caste/Scheduled Tribe to a person who is not a member of Scheduled Caste/Scheduled Tribe and transfer of such sale, gift or bequest of agricultural land of recorded khatedar tenant to non-SC can be held to be void?"

2. The brief facts of the case which have culled out from the record are that the writ petitioners who, in fact, replaced the original writ petitioner Badri Lal Raigar (since deceased) have filed writ petition before the ld. Single Judge assailing order dt. 27.01.1996 passed by the Additional Registrar-II, Co-operative Societies, Rajasthan, Jaipur questioning the auction notice dt. 05.04.1985 issued by the Inspector of Co-operative Societies, Malpura and it was prayed that the auction of agricultural land of the original khatedar (writ petitioner) be declared illegal & quash and set aside such transfer to non-SC being void in view of Sec. 42 of the Act, 1955.

3. The original writ petitioner Badri Lal was by caste Raigar and a member of Scheduled Caste and the real son of Ramcharan but his uncle Ramsukh took him in adoption and both the brothers Ramcharan & Ramsukh (member of SC) were the original khatedars of khasra Nos. 2821, 5408, 5409, 5411, 5413 & 5414 measuring 10 bighas & 10 biswas.

4. The present appellant - Tonk District Co-operative Land Development Bank advanced a loan of Rs. 4,500/- to the respondents in the instant appeal who are legal representatives of the original writ petitioners on 07.08.1971 on the subject land being mortgaged with the Bank as security against the credit facility extended to them. Ramsukh & Ramcharan failed to re-pay the installments and became defaulters and both of them expired.

5. The original writ petitioner Badri Lal claimed that he came to know about the aforesaid loan only when he received a notice from the appellant-Bank on 19.05.1976 informing that a sum of Rs. 2,000/- has been deposited against the loan and on enquiry from office of the appellant-Bank, it revealed that apart from Rs. 2,000/- a sum of Rs. 400/- was deposited by his father on 15.06.1976 and thereafter certain more amount has also been paid. The original writ petitioner Badri Lal thereafter obtained certified copy of the statement of accounts from the appellant-Bank in the year 1981, according to which a sum of Rs. 4,441/- was due to be paid and the original loanee, being defaulter, failed to re-pay the loan.

6. In the year 1980, the Bank attached the electric pump set installed over the subject land and gave the same in custody of Motilal on 16.05.1980 and initiated the auction proceedings of the subject land in question belonging to Badri Lal and finally the land of the petitioner was auctioned on 05.04.1985 for a sum of Rs. 37,401/- and the outstanding loan, as alleged by the Bank, against the petitioner at that time was Rs. 8,600/-. In open auction the subject land was purchased by Maqbool Hussain S/o Ghasi, by caste Muslim, resident of Malpura, District Tonk, who was impleaded as respondent No. 3 in the petition, and possession of the land was also handed over to him & indisputably he is not a member of Scheduled Caste.

7. Aggrieved by the auction proceedings adopted by the Bank, the petitioner initially filed a petition before the Sub-Divisional Officer, Tonk but it was held not maintainable. Thereafter, the petitioner filed revision petition u/Sec. 128 of the Rajasthan Cooperative Societies Act, 19