JUDGMENT

Kshitij Shailendra, J.

Heard Shri Rahul Sripat, learned Senior Counsel assisted by Shri Ishir Sripat, learned counsel for the petitioners in all the writ petitions, Shri S.N. Srivastava, learned Additional Chief Standing Counsel for the State-respondents and Shri Rafiuddin Ansari, learned counsel for the persons who have been impleaded as private respondents in one of the writ petitions.

2. All the aforesaid writ petitions involve common questions of fact and law and are, therefore, being decided by this common judgment.

3. For the purposes of reference, Writ-C No.37439 of 1996 is being treated as the leading case.

4. These petitions have been filed challenging the impugned judgment and order dated 19.11.1996 passed by the Commissioner, Gorakhpur Division, Gorakhpur whereby various appeals filed by the respective tenure holders as well as State of U.P. were decided.

5. The facts of the case as per the record of the writ petitions and the affidavits exchanged between the parties are to the effect that proceedings under the U.P. Imposition of Ceilings on Land Holdings Act, 1960 were held against Ram Harakh Chand and his four sons, namely, Surendra Kumar, Ambrish Kumar, Anil Kumar and Mahendra Kumar and pursuant to the notices issued to the said persons, the Prescribed Authority decided the matter by judgment dated 19.07.1967. After framing seven issues relating to classification of soil, family settlement entered into in between the aforesaid family members, the title of the holdings described in Schedule-I, the Prescribed Authority found the family settlement to be valid and proceeded to determine the ceiling area of all the five persons separately. The Prescribed Authority excluded 34.33 acres of fair quality land from the total holdings of Ram Harakh Chand and included the land under the bed of river as the same stood recorded in the name of tenure holder in village Semara Devi Prasad, Lalpur Tekar. The Prescribed Authority excluded 19.74 acres of ordinary fair quality land area of which comes to 15.06 acres from the holding of Sri Ram Harakh Chand and 7.38 acres of land fair quality of which comes to 4.85 acres from the holding of other persons being the land of grove, abadi, khalihan and compost pit. In totality, the Prescribed Authority declared 531.09 acres of ordinary land as surplus from the holding of all the five persons. The State never challenged the judgment and it became final.

6. Admittedly, U.P. Act No.1 of 1960 was amended by U.P. Act No.2 of 1975 with effect from 08.06.1973. Thereafter, the Prescribed Authority passed an order dated 05.12.1983 in the second round of ceiling proceedings and declared 152.82 acres of irrigated land as surplus.

7. The petitioners filed appeal before the Additional District Judge who decided the same by judgment dated 23.03.1985. Learned Additional District Judge held that there is non compliance of Rule 8; the partition in the family settlement since before the abolition of Zamindari had been found valid in the earlier proceedings decided in 1967 and that it shall operate as res judicata; sale deeds executed prior to 24.01.1971 cannot be questioned and lands under them cannot be included in the holding of petitioners and the Prescribed Authority committed error in interpreting Section 5 (6) of the Act; there is non compliance of Rules 4 and 11 as no notices were issued to the vendees; there is no consideration about the land declared to be of other persons under Section 229 -B of U.P. Z.A. & L.R. Act; and there is no compliance of Section 4 A of the Act for finding out the areas