HIGH COURT OF JAMMU AND KASHMIR AND LADAKH
RAJESH SEKHRI, J.
Chajju Singh & Anr. - Appellant
Versus
Subash Aggarwal & Ors. - Respondent
OW104 No. 56 of 2016
Decided on : 25-05-2023
JUDGEMENT
1. Both the writ petitions afore-captioned, arising out of same Civil Suit, file No. 153/Civil, of the Court of learned Munsiff, Samba (trial Court, for short), are being disposed of by this common judgment.
2. The parties hereinafter shall be referred by their rank and title of the suit i.e. Plaintiff and defendants.
3. Plaintiff-Chajju Ram filed a suit in the trial court for mandatory injunction and for permanent prohibitory injunction against the defendants. Along side the suit, plaintiff filed an application for temporary injunction. Defendant No. 3-Bharat Bhushan, entered appearance, joined the proceedings and filed his written statements as also objections to the application for temporary injunction. Rest of the defendants remained absent and were set ex parte.
4. Plaintiff claims to be owner in possession of land comprising Khasra Nos. 1000 and 1001 measuring 03 kanals and 13 marlas situate at Village Bagla (Jakh Chhani) Tehsil and District, Samba, whereas defendants claim to be owner in possession of different lands bearing Khasra No. 986 min measuring 10 kanals 07 marlas, Khasra No. 102 measuring 01 kanals 09 marlas, Khasra No. 103 measuring 01 kanals 12 marlas, Khasra No. 106 measuring 02 kanals 08 marlas and Khara No. 4377-2856 measuring 07 kanals and 02 marlas, adjacent to the suit land. It is categoric stand of defendant No.3 in the trial court that he has no concern with the suit land i.e. Khasra Nos. 1000 and 1001 and that he is not raising any sort of construction thereon. Defendant No. 3 also filed a counter claim. Learned trial court vide order dated 19.07.2012 directed maintenance of status quo qua the construction, if any, in the suit land by specifying that suit land covers Khasra Nos. 1000 and 1001 only. It is pertinent to mention that learned trial court in the application filed by Defendant No. 3 for counter claim, vide order dated 09.08.2012 also restrained the plaintiff from interfering in the land under his possession.
5. Allegation of the plaintiff is that Defendant No. 3, despite orders of status quo, continued with the construction in the suit land. He filed a petition for initiation of contempt proceedings against him for wilful disobedience of the status quo order. However, Defendant No. 3 maintained that he was not raising construction on the suit land. Therefore, plaintiff filed an application for appointment of local commissioner for inspection of the suit land, purportedly on the strength of some report of Patwari and learned trial court vide order dated 24.02.2016, (impugned in writ Petition No. OW104 No. 56/2016) dismissed the application primarily on the ground that since contempt petition was pending, therefore, local inspection of the suit land by appointment of commissioner was not required to ascertain the genuineness of the report of the Patwari filed in support of the contempt petition.
6. Subsequently, plaintiff filed an application for implementation of the status quo order dated 19.07.2012, through agency of police and learned trial court vide order dated 03.06.2016 (impugned in the second writ petition being OW104 No. 78/2016) directed the said order to be implemented in letter and spirit through Tehsildar concerned with the aid and assistance of police agency.
7. Plaintiff has questioned the impugned order dated 24.02.2016, vide which, his application for appointment of Commissioner has been rejected by the trial court, inter alia on the ground that learned trial court has misread and misconstrued the purpose for which application seeking appointment of Commissioner was filed. According to the plaintiff while seeking appointment of Commissioner, all what he intended to solicit was squarely in consonance with the indulgence already accorded in his favour by learned trial court whereby learned trial court directed to ensure that there should not be any construction in the suit property and had any revenue official, being appointed as a Commissioner, he would have inspected the
AI
Power of Court, under Order 39 Rules 1 and 2 CPC, is to preserve subject matter of lis and to maintain status quo, regarding suit property, as, it exists on date of inception of lis between parties.
Law relating to appointment of Court Commissioner is fairly well settled and that the Court Commissioner cannot be appointed for the purpose of collection of evidence.
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