IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Date of decision: 09.12.2025 Chattar Singh ….Petitioner Versus District Magistrate, Panipat and others ….Respondents CORAM: HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE KULDEEP TIWARI Present: Mr. Divyam Singh, Advocate, and Mr. Yuvraj Singh, Advocate, for Mr. Vikram Singh, Advocate, for the petitioner.

Mr. Kapil Bansal, DAG, Haryana. Mr. Navjeet Singh, Advocate, for Mr. Manoj Kumar Taya, Advocate, for respondents No.6 and 7.

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KULDEEP TIWARI, J. (Oral)

1. By way of instant writ petition, as cast under Articles 226/227 of the Constitution of India, the petitioner, who is a senior citizen, assails the order dated 04.07.2024 (Annexure P-4), vide which, his application, preferred under the provisions of the Maintenance and Welfare of Parents and Senior Citizens Act, 2007 (for short, ‘the Act’) seeking eviction of the private respondents from his residential house, has been dismissed by the learned District Magistrate, Panipat.

2. At the outset, learned counsel for the petitioner, instead of joining issues on merits, fairly submits that, in fact, the order under challenge has been passed by an authority devoid of statutory jurisdiction. He submits that though the application in question was preferred before the learned Maintenance Tribunal, Panipat, in terms of the provisions of the Act, but the same was erroneously transferred to the learned District Magistrate, who, vide impugned order, has dismissed the same. In this view of the matter, the impugned order is liable to be set aside. To lend credence to the submissions, he places reliance upon a verdict dated 10.11.2025, drawn by this Court in CWP-17393-2018 (Ranjit Kaur Vs. State of Haryana and others).

3. Learned counsel for respondents No.6 and 7 fails to refer to any judicial pronouncement, so as to refute the abovesaid factual aspect of the matter.

4. This Court has heard learned counsel for the parties, and perused the record.

5. The issue, as raised by learned counsel for the petitioner, has already been contemplated by this Court in CWP-17393-2018, thereby, holding that the application embodying the prayer for eviction can very well be adjudicated by the learned Maintenance Tribunal itself, in terms of the Act. Concededly, in the matter at hand, the petitioner had preferred the application (supra) before the learned Maintenance Tribunal, therefore, the same ought to have been decided by the Tribunal itself, rather than the learned District Magistrate.

6. At this juncture, it would be expedient to refer to the relevant observations made in the judgment (ibid), and the same are extracted hereinbelow:-

17. It is also pertinent to record here that the complaint/ application filed by respondent No.4 under Section 22(2) is not maintainable before the District Magistrate, as such applications lie before the Maintenance Tribunal presided over by the Sub-Divisional Magistrate. The issue is no longer res integra, as it has been consistently held that applications seeking eviction orders under the Act of 2007 are required to be filed before the Maintenance Tribunal- cum-Sub-Divisional Magistrate and not before the Appellate Tribunal-cum-District Magistrate. A similar issue was considered by this Court in CWP-22501-2021, which was disposed of on 27.10.2025 with the following observations:

“5. This Court has heard the submissions made by the learned counsel for the parties concerned, and has also examined the issue. In Gurdial Singh (supra) case, the Coordinate Bench of this Court, has held that since the notification has been issued by the State of Punjab, wherethrough, the powers have been bestowed with the Maintenance Tribunal, to adjudicate the application seeking eviction. The relevant extract from the said judgment is extracted hereinafter:-

“4. A perusal of the above instructions would show that in view of the judgment passed by the Hon'ble Supreme Court and by this Court, it has been decided by the State of Punjab that the Maintenance Tribunal can pass th