The main legal point established in the judgment is that correction of revenue entries can only be ordered by a civil court and not by the Revenue Officer.

ORDER

Shri Narinder Chauhan, I.A.S.

The revision petition preferred under section 114(3) of the H.P. Tenancy & and Reforms Act, 1972, is directed against the order dated 17.12.2007, passed by the Commissioner, Kangra Division, in Appeal No. 240/2003, whereby he has accepted the appeal and set aside the orders passed by both the courts below.

2. Briefly stated, the facts of the case are that present petitioners no.1 and 2 filed an application before the LRO-cum-A.C. 1st Grade, Dehra, on 4.10.1996, for correction of revenue entries qua ownership and possession of land comprising khata/khatauni no.44 min/46 min, khasra no.153 and 165, area measuring 1-07-69 hectares, situated in Mohal Bari Chalian, Mauza Sihorpian, Tehsil Dehra. District Kangra, as per jamabandi for the year 1990-91. The applicants requested for correction to the extent of their 2/15 share of the land mentioned therein in the column of ownership and possession, requesting that all the entries in favour of the respondent regarding ownership and possession were wrong and deserved to be corrected. According to the applicants, the land was previously owned and possessed by one Shri Tulsi Ram, and the applicants purchased the share from Tulsi Ram, along with other land in the year 1960, and mutations no.189 and 190, to this effect were also sanctioned and attested in their favour as recorded in the remarks column of jamabandi for the year 1959-60. The applicants never inducted respondent (Pratap Chand) as a tenant over their share nor the respondent ever cultivated the land, but the respondent in collusion with lower revenue staff wrongly got himself recorded as a tenant over the whole khata, that such entries were made without their knowledge and illegally. That the respondent got proprietary rights transferred in his favour vide mutation no.262 on the basis of wrong revenue entries. It was, therefore, prayed that correction qua 2/15 shares of the land mentioned above in favour of the applicants in the column of ownership and possession be made in the interest of justice.

3. The LRO, Dehra inquired into the matter and allowed the application vide order dated 16.2.2002, holding that the respondent was not a tenant of the applicants (present petitioners), and as such, mutation no.262, conferring proprietary rights on the respondent qua their share in the impugned land was wrong, and he accordingly ordered substitution of new entry vide which the share of tenant (Pratap Chand) was ordered to be recorded as 9330 shares out of total 10769 shares.

4. Feeling aggrieved with this order of the LRO, Dehra, dated 16.2.2002, the present respondent, Shri Partap Chand, filed an appeal before the Distt Collector, Kangra, on the grounds that Shri Prem Chand and his wife Smt. Prabhati Devi, had no locus standi to file the Correction application and as such the correction has been wrongly ordered; that the LRO has passed an order in mutation no.262 wherein the appellant was declared owner on the strength of tenancy and thus the finding of LRO, dated 16.2.2002 are wrong and illegal; that the revenue entries were incorporated in various subsequent jamabandis, and in that case the LRO, had no authority to correct the same. Further that the LRO has failed to appreciate that in the jamabandis for the year 1959-60,1963-64 and 1968-69, Shri Tulsi Ram is recorded as owner along with his real brothers Shri Bhagwan Dass, Raghunath Sahay, Babu Ram and Babu Lal sons of Beeru, residents of Garli, Tehsil Dehra; that the LRO has travelled beyond his jurisdiction to try the case and to effect correction in the revenue documents i.e. jamabandis relating to 1962-63. The appellant further asserted that an order passed by any court cannot be again modified by the same court except by way of appeal or revision, in this case the same LRO had passed order of conferring proprietary rights under section 104 of the H.P. Tenancy & Land Reforms Act, on 18.11.1978 vide mutation no.262. That the LRO while declaring mut