ORDER : -This writ petition has been filed on behalf of 734 applicants who have impleaded as opposite parties the State of Uttar Pradesh, Minister for Revenue and Agriculture, U.P., Land Reforms Commissioner, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, Collector of Meerut, Collector of Muzaffarnagar, ten Sub-Divisional Officers of various sub-divisions in Meerut, Muzaffarnagar and Ghaziabad as also 609 persons who have been appointed Lekhpals.

2. A preliminary objection was raised by the learned Standing Counsel that an application by 734 petitioners against 609 Lekhpals would give rise to confusion as the facts may not be same in every case and the considerations that might have weighed in each case might have been different.

3. It is, however, not necessary to go into the preliminary objection as Mr. Pathak has stated that he will not go into the individual cases of the 734 petitioners or the 609 Lekhpals but would confine himself to general questions which affect them all.

4. In the State of Uttar Pradesh there was a class of Government servants who were known as Patwaris. Their number was about twenty-eight thousand. They were appointed under the rules made under S.234, Land Revenue Act (3 of 1901).

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