Rakesh Kumar Jain, J.

1. Defendant is in second appeal. The brief facts of the case are that plaintiff/respondent herein filed suit for mandatory injunction with a consequential relief of temporary injunction, alleging that plaintiff is the owner in possession of a house in Village Kaimla Tehsil Gharaunda, District Karnal. A street shown in the site plan Fx.PW3/A, in red colour, is alleged to be a personal street of the plaintiff, which leads from the public street (Gali shar-e-aam) situated in the western side. The said street is used by the plaintiff since the time of his forefathers for approaching their house but the defendant, illegally and forcibly, had encroached upon the street by raising some construction much less a lintel. The defendant, in his written statement, alleged that the plaintiff has no locus standi to file the suit as he is not the owner of the street. The character of the street of private street was also denied. It was alleged that it is a public street constructed by the Gram Panchayat of the village and is being used for ingress and egress of all the inhabitants and residents of the village including the defendant whose houses are situated in front of each other on both sides, West and East, of the street. The doors and windows of both the houses of the defendant open towards the disputed street having projection about two feet wide on each side constructed prior to filing of the suit. The other inhabitants of the street had also constructed two feet wide projection over their doors and windows. The averments made in the written statement were rebutted by the plaintiff by way of replication and on the pleadings of the parties, the following issues were framed :-

" 1. Whether the plaintiff is entitled for decree for mandatory injunction with consequential relief of permanent injunction as prayed for? OPP

2. Whether the suit is not maintainable ? OPD

3. Whether plaintiff has no locus standi to file the present suit ? OPD.

4. Relief.

2. After taking into account both oral as well as documentary evidence, both courts below have held that the street alleged by plaintiff to be private is in fact a public street but the suit of the plaintiff was decreed tothe effect that the defendant shall remove whatever construction he has raised as projection over the doors and windows.

3. Aggrieved against the judgment and decree of both the Courts below, the present appeal has been preferred by the defendant/appellant, in which the question of law that has been raised is that if "If the gali is proved, as a fact, to be public street in the village, then the present suit in the present form, at the instance of the private person, is maintainable? Whether the public street in the village is Shamlat and any encroachment thereupon can be removed through civil suit or under the provisions of the Punjab Village Common Lands (Regulation) Act, 1961."

4. Learned counsel for the appellant has vehemently argued that once the fact has been established that the street is a public street, then it falls in the Gram Panchayat being Shamlat in view of the definition provided under the Punjab Village Common Lands (Regulation) Act, 1961 (for short the Act) under Section 2(g)(4), which provides as under :-

"lands used or reserved for the benefit of village community including streets, lanes, playgrounds, schools, drinking wells or ponds situated within the sabha area as defined in clause (mmm) of Section 3 of the Punjab Gram Panchayat Act, 1952, excluding lands reserved for the common purposes of a village under Section 18 of the East Punjab Holdings (consolidation and prevention of Fragmentation) Act, 1948 (East Punjab Act 50 of 1948), the management and control whereof vests in the State Government under Section 23- A of the aforesaid Act." He further submits that if the public street falls within the Shamlat and Civil Court does not have the jurisdiction, the grievance of an inhabitant can still redressed under Section 7 of the