ORDER

The captioned writ petition is filed by the legal heir of the original grantee, feeling aggrieved by the order passed by respondent No.2/Deputy Commissioner, who has allowed purchaser's appeal and reversed the order passed by respondent No.3/Assistant Commissioner.

2. Facts leading to the case is as under:

The authorities granted the petition land in favour of the petitioner's father, namely Munigangappa, on 17.09.1973 with a non-alienation condition for a period of 15 years. The original grantee, along with his sons, alienated the property in favour of respondent No.4 under registered sale deed dated 17.07.1995. The petitioners herein, alleging that alienation is in contravention, filed an application under Sections 4 and 5 of the PTCL Act in 2012. Respondent No.3/Assistant Commissioner allowed the restoration on the ground that the alienation is in contravention of the PTCL Act. The Deputy Commissioner, however, found that restoration is sought after a lapse of 17 years and, therefore, applying the law laid down by the Apex Court in the case of Nekkanti Rama Lakshmi, allowed the appeal and set aside the order passed by respondent No.3/Assistant Commissioner. The said order is under challenge by the legal heir of the original grantee. The question that requires consideration at the hands of this Court is whether the present petitioners could have invoked the provisions of the PTCL Act. On perusal of Form No.1, issued by the authority vide Annexure-B, it is clearly evident that the petitioner's father participated in an auction and the authorities executed a sale deed pursuant to acceptance of the bit amount by the petitioner's father. On perusal of Form No.1 issued by the authority, which is a grant certificate, which is issued in terms of Appendix-E to the Mysore Land Revenue Code, 1888, it is clearly evident that though it is styled as a grant certificate, the same has to be treated as a title document. The fact that the authority has issued Form No.1 clearly leads to an inference that it is not a grant in favour of the depressed class. The issue in regard to the grant certificate issued under Form No.1 is no more resintegra. The Apex Court in the case of B.K.Muniraju .vs. State of Karnataka1 has held as under;

"The document in question has been styled as "certificate of grant". In order to know the real nature of the document, one has to look into the recitals of the document and not the title of the document. The intention is to be gathered from recitals in the deed, conduct of the parties and evidence on record. It is settled law that question of construction of a document is to be decided by finding out intention of the executant, firstly, from a comprehensive reading of the terms of the document itself, and then, by looking into, to the extent permissible, the prevailing circumstances which persuaded the author of the document to execute it. With a view to ascertain the nature of a transaction, the document has to be read as a whole. A sentence or term used may not be determinative of real nature of transaction."

3. The law laid down by the Apex Court in the case of B.K.Muniraju is squarely applicable to the present case

1 (2008) 4 SCC 451

on hand. Respondent No.3/Assistant Commissioner had no jurisdiction to order for restoration as the petition land is not a granted land as defined under Section 3(e) of the PTCL Act, 1978. Respondent No.3/Assistant Commissioner erred in exercising under the provisions of the PTCL Act. The order of restoration is one without jurisdiction, and therefore, I am of the view that the said order is a nullity and ________ has no sanctity under the law.

4. Be that as it may, even otherwise this Court would find that restoration petition filed by the petitioners is liable to be rejected as there is delay of 17 years. The law laid down by the Apex Court in the case of Nekkanti Rama Lakshmi .vs. State of Karnataka and another2 and Vivek M. Hinduja .vs. M. Aswatha3 are squarely applicable to the