To establish adverse possession, claimants must demonstrate peaceful, continuous, and hostile possession over statutory periods, contradicting the principles of ownership, as affirmed by the Supreme Court.

1. Leave granted. These appeals arise out of a common judgment and order dated 30-5-2012 [Bangalore Development Authority v. Prabhaudas Patel, Regular First Appeal No. 911 of 2002, decided on 30-5-2012 (Kant)] passed by a Single Bench of the High Court of Karnataka at Bangalore whereby the High Court has allowed RFAs Nos. 912, 914, 915 and 916 of 2002, set aside the judgments and orders of the courts below and dismissed the suits relevant to those appeals. The High Court has, at the same time, affirmed the decree passed in OS No. 6925 of 2001 and dismissed RFA No. 911 of 2002 filed by the appellant against the same. The factual backdrop in which the suits and the appeals mentioned above came to be filed may be summarised as under.

2. M. Venkatesh, appellant in SLP (C) No. 38601 of 2012 claimed ownership over the suit schedule property by inheritance from his grandfather Munishamappa who is said to have purchased the same under a registered sale deed dated 7-7-1954. In connected SLP (C) No. 12016 of 2013 Prabhaudas Patel also claimed to be the owner of suit schedule property relevant to his suit on the basis of purchase of the said property from its previous owner. The aforementioned two parcels of land together with a larger extent in the vicinity were acquired by the Bangalore Development Authority (“BDA”, for short) for the formation of Hosur Road, Sarjapur Layout in terms of a preliminary Notification dated 17-7-1984 and a final Notification dated 28-11-1986 published on 25-12-1986, after notices to the khatedars and the persons interested, some of whom had filed their claims before the competent authority.

3. Determination of amount of compensation payable to the landowners having been approved by the competent authority on 21-8-1986, BDA claimed that possession of the land was taken over from the landowners and handed over to the engineering section of the Authority by drawing a possession mahazar on 6-11-1987. A Notification under S.16(2) of the Act was also published in the Karnataka Gazette dated 4-7-1991 which, according to BDA, signified that the land in question stood vested with BDA free from all encumbrances whatsoever. The further case of BDA is that long after the land had vested in BDA, sites were carved out and sold to different persons by the erstwhile owners, the unauthorised act of the plaintiffs, however, got vacated and the possession was taken over.

4. The case of the plaintiffs M. Venkatesh and Prabhaudas Patel, on the other hand, was that they were always in established possession of the suit schedule property owned and that apprehending their dispossession from the same they had approached the High Court along with several others to restrain BDA from interfering with their peaceful occupation of the suit property. Those petitions were disposed of by the High Court reserving liberty to the writ petitioners to approach the civil court for appropriate relief in a proper civil action. It was only after the disposal of the said petitions that OSs Nos. 3075 and 7945 of 2000, 6925, 5742 and 5791 of 2001 came to be filed by the aggrieved parties in which the plaintiffs claimed to be the owners and occupants of the suit property and prayed for an order restraining BDA from interfering with their peaceful occupation. The plaintiffs also claimed that they had the title over the suit schedule property by prescription.

5. The suits aforementioned were contested by the defendant BDA in which they, inter alia, claimed that the suit property stood duly acquired and its ownership vested in BDA was free from all encumbrances whatsoever and