The court ruled that irrelevant considerations led to the denial of land entry correction, emphasizing proper application of relevant law.

JUDGMENT

The petitioners in both these writ petitions are same and the issues involved are also similar. The writ petitions are hence heard and disposed of together.

2. The petitioner owns an extent of 0.1375 Hectares of land in Sy.No.44/1, 0.0081 Hectares of land in Sy.No.44/8 and 0.4281 Hectares of land in Sy.No.47/1 of Vaniyamkulam-2 Village, Ottappalam Taluk, Palakkad district. The petitioner has produced the title deeds relating to the property which are of the years 1997, 2007, and 2011. The properties of the petitioner are not included as paddy land or wetland in the data bank that had been prepared. Instead, the properties in Sy.No.44/1 and 44/8 have been shown as “partly converted 10 years back” and the property in Sy.No.47/1 is shown as “partly converted 13 years back”. The petitioner had preferred applications in Form 5 for correction of the data bank since an entry in the nature referred above will cause difficulties. The copies of the applications have been produced as Exts.P2 and P3 in W.P.(C)No.25379 of 2021 and as Ext.P3 in W.P.(C)No.26112 of 2021. The applications were rejected as per proceedings dated 25.11.2020 which have been produced as Exts.P4 and P5 in W.P.(C)No.25379 of 2021 and as Ext.P4 in W.P.(C)No.26112 of 2021. The grievance of the petitioner is that the respondent has treated the applications submitted by the petitioner as applications seeking conversion of the properties and on such a wrong premise, the applications have been rejected observing that the Local Level Monitoring Committee (LLMC) has in its report stated that there is no necessity to remove the property from the data bank. The very aspect that the property has not been included as paddy land or wetland in the data bank has not been considered. The petitioner points out that even in the report of the LLMC, there is no unanimous opinion regarding the aspect and out of the three members, one of the members has stated that he recommends the correction. The report of the LLMC also would indicate that what has been considered is whether the property can be converted. The petitioner has produced a location sketch relating to the property, issued by the Village Officer, which would show that on one side of the property there is a road and on all other sides there are residential houses. The petitioner submits that the very purpose of an application in Form 5 is for the correction of an entry and it has nothing to do with the conversion of the properties. The petitioner also relies on the judgment of this Court in Salim v. State of of Keala reported in [ 2017 (1) KLT 392 ], wherein this Court has held that after the data bank is published, the Officers become functus officio.

3. Heard the learned counsel for the petitioner and the learned Government Pleader for the respondent.

4. I find considerable force in the contentions raised by the counsel for the petitioners. A reading of the orders issued by the respondent clearly shows that the respondent has not considered the relevant aspects and totally irrelevant considerations have gone into the decision making. I find that the request before the authorities was only regarding the correction of the entry and not regarding any permission for conversion of land or its user.

5. In the result, the writ petitions are allowed. Ext.P4 in W.P.(C)No.26112 of 2021 and Exts.P4 and P5 in W.P.(C)No.25379 of 2021 are quashed. It is declared that the properties of the petitioner, having not been included in the data bank as paddy land or wetland, will not come under the definition of “paddy land” or “wetland” as defined under Section 2 (12) of the Kerala Conservation of Paddy Land and Wetland Act ,