Section 17 of the Punjab Land Reforms Act, 1973 invalidated any decree or order of ejectment passed under the old Acts to the extent the old Acts were inconsistent with the provisions of the New Act.

1. This order will dispose of two writ petitions under Arts. 226 and 227 of the Constitution - Swaran Singh V/s. Financial Commissioner, Revenue, Punjab and others, C. W. No. 81 of 1975 and Dalip Singh V/s. Financial Commissioner, Revenue, Punjab and others, C. W. 113 of 1975 for quashing the impugned orders (Annexure P. 4 in each petition), dated 21.11.1974 by which the revision petition filed by each of the petitioners was dismissed by the Financial Commissioner, Revenue, Punjab ordering the ejectment of the petitioners from the land in dispute.

2. Some land of Bal Singh respondent No. 5 (hereinafter to be called the Landlord) was declared as surplus, being in excess of the permissible limit, under the provisions of the Punjab Security of Land Tenures Act, 1953 (hereinafter to be called the Punjab Act). The petitioners in both these writ petitions were resettled on a part of the land so declared surplus under the Punjab Act and the rules framed thereunder. According to the provisions of the Punjab Act, the landlord continued to be the owner of the land which had been declared surplus and thus the petitioners after resettlement became his tenants. As the landlord refused to accept rent from the petitioners, the latter filed applications on 5-5-1970 and 14-5-1970 under Section 14-A (iii) of the Punjab Act for the deposit of rent. In order to defeat the attempt of the petitioners, the landlord submitted an application on 7-9-1970 under Section 9 of the Punjab Act for the ejectment of the petitioners on the ground that they had failed to pay rent without sufficient cause. In this application arrears of rent had been claimed for Kharif 1968 to Rabi 1970. In the applications filed by the petitioners, rent as claimed to be due from them was deposited under the orders of the Assistant Collector, Revenue, on 25-9-1970 and subsequently the arrears of rent as ordered were deposited. However, in the proceedings initiated by the landlord for the ejectment of the petitioners, an order of ejectment was passed by the Assistant Collector on 7-4-1971 with a finding that the petitioners had failed to pay the rent regularly without sufficient cause. Appeals filed by the petitioners against the above order failed and were dismissed by the Collector by his order dated 11-1-1972. Another attempt made by the petitioners in revision before the Additional Commissioner also failed and the revision petitions were dismissed on 26-6-1973. Further revisions by the petitioners were also dismissed by the learned Financial Commissioner by the impugned orders on 21-11-1974. The orders of ejectment by the Asstt. Collector, the Collector and the Addl. Commissioner are respectively marked as Annexures P. 1, P. 2 and P. 3. It is the impugned order, Annexure P. 4, of the learned Financial Commissioner in each petition which has been challenged.

3. It may be mentioned here that Dalip Singh petitioner in C. W. 113 of 1975 continued to be possession of the land in dispute as a result of the stay order issued by the Motion Bench. However, in the writ petition filed by Swaran Singh, petitioner in C. W. 61 of 1975, though dispossession was stayed by the Motion Bench in the first instance, but that order was subsequently vacated and Swaran Singh petitioner is, therefore, not in possession of the land at present.

4. Before the learned Financial Commissioner, the order of ejectment by the authorities below was challenged by the petitioners on two grounds. Firstly, that the petitioners were not liable to be ejected as they had not failed to pay the rent regularly, rather the landlord refused to accept the rent presented by them, and consequently the petitioners submitted an application before the Assistant Collector for deposit of arrears of rent before the application for their ejectment was filed by the landlord, and in pursuance of the order of the Assistant Collector rent due was duly deposited. Secondly, that the order of ejectment was inoperative according to