The main legal point established in the judgment is the significance of purchase deeds and actions under the Land Reforms Act in establishing ownership of lands, as well as the importance of valid registration of documents under the Registration Act, 1908.

1. All these writ petitions came to be posted on being specially ordered by the Hon'ble Chief Justice vide order dated 18.07.2012.

2. These writ petitions are fall out of the litigations launched by the two groups of persons, who were claiming to be owners of lands in Morai Village. Several writ petitions and suits as well as civil revision petitions were filed by these two groups. For the sake of brevity, they can be called as Amaravathy Cranes group and Rajendra Raja group. Since some of the writ petitions also related to the same survey numbers and also impleaded Rajendra Raja and his group, it is necessary to recapitulate the dispute between the Amaravathy Cranes group and Rajendra Raja group.

The case put up by the Amaravathy Cranes group are as follows:–

3. The lands to an extent of 1743 acres in Morai Village were taken over by the District Collector of the Chengalpattu District under Rule 75A(1) of the Defence of India Rules during the Second World War vide proceedings, dated 26.10.1944. After the end of the World War-II, lands were de-requisitioned to the respective land owners. Since the land use pattern was considerably changed, the land owners had decided to sell the lands. Accordingly, the Amaravathy Cranes had purchased the properties from the respective land owners under 39 sale deeds in the year 1965. The Amaravathy Cranes purchased a vast extent of agricultural punja lands comprised in different survey numbers in Morai village by virtue of sale deeds. It was claimed that ever since the purchase, the company was in possession and enjoyment being its absolute owner.

4. The Board of Revenue on 11.09.1967 took a decision to set aside the existing registry made at the time of settlement in respect of the lands and decided to conduct a denova settlement enquiry after complying with the procedures contemplated under the Tamil Nadu Act 26 of 1948. A suo motu enquiry was taken up for the grant of ryotwari patta in respect of S.No.474/1 onwards in Morai village. The settlement Tahsildar at Chengalpattu was authorised to conduct an enquiry vide notification dated 19.5.1976. The Settlement Tahsildar had conducted an enquiry and included the land for the grant of ryotwari patta. He had passed an order on 23.7.1976, 24.07.1976 and 30.07.1976 in respect of proceedings in S.R.Nos.14 to 16 of 1976. The Settlement Tahsildar had issued ryotwari patta not only to the Amaravathy Cranes, but also to 46 other persons. The Amaravathy Cranes got ryotwari patta to an extent of 165 acres. In respect of other lands, several other individuals were given patta. No one questioned the ryotwari patta granted by the Settlement Tahsildar to those 46 persons by the same proceedings issued. The other lands were also classified as assessed waste manavari, cart track poramboke, temple poramboke, assessed waster dry, channel poramboke, puzhakal poramboke and road poramboke. Subsequent to the amendment made to the Tamil Nadu Land Reforms (Fixation of Ceiling on Land) Act, 1961, as amended by the Tamil Nadu Act 17 of 1970, the Authorised Officer (Land Reforms), Kancheepuram under whose jurisdiction the lands were situated took an action in terms of the provisions of the Land Ceiling Act. He had published a draft settlement under Section 10(1) of the Land Reforms Act vide gazette notification, dated 25.03.1981 and served the copy on the Amaravathy Cranes.

5. The Amaravathy Cranes had filed its objection before the Authorised officer. The Authorised Officer by virtue of the power under Section 10(5) of the Act had rejected the objection made by the Amaravathy Cranes. The Amaravathy Cranes had filed a revision petition under Section 82 of the Land Reforms Act before the Land Commissioner, Chennai. The revision was also dismissed on the ground of maintainability in view of the appeal available under Section 78 of the Act. Thereafter, the Amaravathy Cranes filed an appeal before the Land Tribunal in LT CMA No.86 of 1991. The appeal was allowed o