ALOK PANDA vs ADDL. COMNR., ADDL. REVISIONAL COURT- IV, ODISHA, BBSR
- Court
- Odisha High Court
IN THE HIGH COURT OF ORISSA AT CUTTACK
W.P.(C) No.4688 of 2025
ODHC010063912025
W.P.(C) No.2973 of 2025
ODHC010063982025
W.P.(C) No.3007 of 2025
ODHC010063782025
W.P.(C) No.3039 of 2025
ODHC010064162025
W.P.(C) No. 5047 of 2025
ODHC010065412025
W.P.(C) No.7634 of 2025
ODHC010166442025
(Applications under Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution of India)
W.P.(C) No.4688 of 2025
Pankajbasini Panda … Petitioner
- versus-
Addl. Comnr., Addl. Revisional
Court-IV, Odisha, BBSR & Ors. … Opposite Parties
W.P.(C) No.2973 of 2025
Alok Panda … Petitioner
- versus-
Addl. Comnr., Addl. Revisional
Court-IV, Odisha, BBSR & Ors. … Opposite Parties
W.P.(C) No.3007 of 2025
Banajyostna Pattanaik … Petitioner
- versus-
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W.P.(C) No.3007 of 2025 & Batch Page of 13
Addl. Comnr., Addl. Revisional
Court-IV, Odisha, BBSR & Ors. … Opposite Parties
W.P.(C) No.3039 of 2025
Rupak Panda … Petitioner
-
versus-
Addl. Comnr., Addl. Revisional
Court-IV, Odisha, BBSR & Ors. … Opposite Parties
W.P.(C) No. 5047 of 2025
Tara Prasanna Sahoo … Petitioner
- versus-
Addl. Comnr., Addl. Revisional
Court-IV, Odisha, BBSR & Ors. … Opposite Parties
W.P.(C) No.7634 of 2025
Sarat Chandra Rout
… Petitioner
- versus-
Addl. Comnr., Addl. Revisional
Court-IV, Odisha, BBSR & Ors. … Opposite Parties
Advocates appeared in the case through hybrid mode:
For Petitioners : Mr. P.K.Mohanty,
Sr. Advocate.
Mr. P. Mohanty, Advocate
For Opposite Parties : Mr. G. Mohanty, S.C.
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W.P.(C) No.3007 of 2025 & Batch Page of 13
CORAM:
JUSTICE SASHIKANTA MISHRA
JUDGMENT
16.10.2026
Sashikanta Mishra,J .
Since the facts and questions of law involved in all
these writ applications are substantially similar and the
matters have been heard analogously, all the writ
applications are being disposed of by this common
judgment. For the sake of brevity and convenience,
however, the facts of W.P.(C) No.3007 of 2025 shall be
considered and referred to.
2. The case of the petitioner, briefly stated, is that the
case land was originally leased out by the Government to
one Kasinath Naik in W.L.L. Case No.2719/1973,
measuring an area of one acre. He was a Scheduled Caste
person and after obtaining permission from the Revenue
Officer, Bhubaneswar in Revenue Case No.6/1984 on
11.04.1984, he sold an area of Ac. 0.250 decs. to the
present opposite party No.7 vide RSD dated 04.07.1984.
Opposite Party No.7 sold a portion thereof being Ac.0.062.5
decs. to the Opposite Party No.8 vide RSD dated 24.9.2003.
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Opposite Party No.8, in turn, sold the said land to the
Petitioner vide RSD dated 07.12.2005. Subsequently,
Opposite Party No.7 again sold an area of Ac.0.1.25 decs. to
the petitioner through his power of attorney holder,
Opposite Party No.9 vide RSD dtd.25.6.2004. Yet again,
Opposite Party No.7 sold the remaining land to the
petitioner vide RSD dated 26.10.2004. Thus, the petitioner
acquired the land through three sale deeds and on being
delivered possession, became the absolute owner in
possession of Ac.0.250 decs.
The genuineness of the lease granted in favour of the
original lessee was sought to be verified by the Addl.
District Magistrate (A.D.M.) under the OGLS Act. He found
the lease being granted properly but remanded the matter
to the Tahasildar for fresh inquiry vide order
dtd.25.04.1987. Accordingly, W.L.L. Remand Case
No.81/1988 was initiated by the Tahasildar, Bhubaneswar,
who after making necessary field inquiry through the R.I.,
passed order on 20.04.1995 holding that the lease granted
in favour of the original lessee, Kasinath Naik, is valid.
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Said order has not been challenged before any forum
thereafter.
The petitioner being in possession, continued to pay
rent till 2011-2012, when settlement operations began.
During the settlement operations, the A.S.O., on
consideration of the registered sale deeds executed in
favour of the petitioner, directed recording of the land in
her name in the Yadast. The Not-Final R.O.R. ( Parcha ) was
accordingly issued. While the petitioner was expecting the
land to be finally recorded in her favour, she was surprised
to find that ignoring all records as well as the Yadast
report, the Asst. Settlement Officer passed an order on
23.08.2013 recording the land in Abadjogya Anabadi
Khata . The order was passed on the ground that the land
was not used for the purpose for which it was allotted to
the lessee.
Under such circumstances, the petitioner preferred
revision under Section 15(b) of the OSS Act before the Addl.
Commissioner, Addl. Revisional Court No.1, Odisha,
Bhubaneswar being registered as O.S.S. Case
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No.709/2020. The petitioner, in her revision petition
narrated all the relevant facts sequentially as also the
orders passed by the A.D.M. and the Tahasildar holding the
lease valid. However, the revisional court, without proper
appreciation of the facts and materials on record dismissed
the revision mainly on the ground that the validity of the
lease was doubtful. Said order is impugned in the present
writ petition.
3. No counter affidavit has been filed by the State-
opposite parties though the State counsel preferred to make
oral submissions.
4. Heard Mr. P.K.Mohanty, learned Senior counsel with
Mr. P.Mohanty for the petitioner and Mr. G. Mohanty,
learned Standing Counsel for the State.
5. Mr. Mohanty assails the impugned order by
submitting that the revisional authority has acted contrary
to the settled position of law that the validity of lease is not
within the domain of the authorities under the OSS Act.
Once the statutory authority, being the A.D.M. followed by
the Tahasildar has acted within the parameters of the
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relevant statute, that is, OGLS Act, the settlement
authorities or the revisional authority under the OSS Act
have no power to enter into the same. Mr. Mohanty further
argues that even otherwise, there is absolutely no doubt
with regard to validity of the lease granted in favour of the
original lessee (Opposite Party No.6). In a subsequent
inquiry, the Tahasildar found the lease valid and the
petitioner in possession. In any case, the petitioner being
the purchaser, cannot be called upon to produce the lease
case record or the order passed therein.
6. Per contra, Mr. Mohanty, learned State counsel, would
argue that while the authorities acting under the OSS Act
may not enter into the question of validity of lease yet the
same is required only to verify the valid source and flow of
title of the petitioner. If the lease, being the source, is
invalid, obviously the Petitioner cannot claim to have
acquired valid title over the case land. Mr. Mohanty
therefore, submits that revision was rightly dismissed.
7. Having heard learned counsel for the parties and on
perusal of the impugned order as well as the materials on
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record, this Court is of the view that the authorities under
the OSS Act cannot usurp jurisdiction of the authorities
under the OGLS Act to decide the question of validity of a
lease granted by the State earlier. This is the position of
law long settled by several judicial pronouncements of this
1
Court. The case of Narottam Rath v. State of Odisha ,
can be profitably referred to in this regard, wherein this
Court observed as follows:
8 . Then there are a series of orders passed by the
“
Division Benches of this Court in 2014 including an
th
order dated 4 July 2014 in W.P. (C) No. 8402 of
th
2014 (Nilendri Mohanty v. State); an order dated 4
July 2014 in W.P.(C) No. 8237 of 2014 (Kamal Basini
th
Mohanty v. State of Orissa); an order dated 8 July
2014 in W.P.(C) No. 11165 of 2014 (Kapaleswar
Firms Pvt. Ltd. v. State of Odisha); and an order
th
dated 27 October 2014 in a batch of writ petitions,
the lead case of which was W.P.(C) No. 4596 of 2014
(Tridev Kodamasingh v. State of Odisha), where it
was held as under:
“The leases having been granted either under the
OGLS Act or under any other appropriate law, unless
and until it is set aside or declared invalid by the
competent authority under the appropriate statute the
lease cannot be said to be invalid. Unless and until
the lease is either set aside or leasehold lands are
resumed by the order of the competent authority, the
Assistant Settlement Officer/Settlement authorities
are bound by the lease orders and have no
jurisdiction to question the validity of the lease
concerned. For the omission of the State Government
to scrutinize and to find out any irregularities in
respect of any lease, no fault can be imputed either to
the lessees or to the petitioner, who have purchased
1
2023 SCC OnLine Ori 153
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by registered sale deeds portions of such leasehold
lands. Since the Assistant Settlement Officer was in
seisin of the matter, it was incumbent on him to make
field enquiry to find out the actual possession of the
petitioners and he having not done so it is not open to
him to doubt about the possession of the petitioners
over the lands which they claimed and on that ground
direct recording of the land in favour of the State.”
xx xx xx
10 .
xx xx xx “10. … It must be made clear that it was
none of the business of the Assistant Settlement
Officer to go into the question of correctness of lease
and direct to change the draft record because the
authority under the OGLS Act, lease principle or
Government Grants Act under which there are
hierarchy of authorities to take cognizance of any
irregularity and illegality and then pass the order of
cancellation under the concerned statute. The
Assistant Settlement Officer is not authorized to
encroach upon the authority as prescribed under
other revenue laws to behave like appellate authority
to cancel the lease. On the other hand, the impugned
order passed by the Assistant Settlement Officer is
without jurisdiction and wholly erroneous. Similarly,
the Additional Sub-Collector, without mentioning the
provision of law under which he heard the appeal,
has dismissed the appeal and as such, the same is
also without jurisdiction and illegal.
xx xx xx
20. Clearly the ASOs were acting without jurisdiction
and beyond the scope of their powers under the OSS
Act It is obvious that powers which could have been
exercised only under the OGLS Act were sought to be
exercised by the ASO which was impermissible in law
for them to do. The above extracted portions of the
orders of this Court conclusively settle the legal
position in this regard and do not bear repetition.”
8. Even otherwise, the claim of the petitioner that the
lease of the land was originally granted to Opposite Party
No.6 has not been rebutted in any manner. On the
contrary, it is seen that in W.L.L. Remand Case
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No.81/1988, the lease granted vide W.L.L. Case
No.2719/1973 in favour of Opposite Party No.6 was held to
be valid. The same is also reflected in the yadast as well as
the Not Final ROR ( Parcha ) mentioning the subsequent
purchase by the petitioner. All these facts were pleaded in
detail and sequentially by the portioner in her revision
petition. The revisional authority however, drew adverse
inference on the ground that she had not submitted
certified copy of W.L.L. Case No.2719/1973. This Court
fails to understand the logic behind such finding for the
reason that when the lease case is known and the
petitioner is admittedly not the lessee, the concerned
authorities in custody of the case record could have been
called upon by the revisional court to transmit the case
record. The other ground that the petitioner did not submit
Hal-Sabik correlation also appears to be an error of record
inasmuch as the revision petition clearly describes the
same in the schedule appended thereto. The further
observation of the revisional Court that the lease re-
enquired by the Tahasildar must have been sent to Sub-
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Collector, Bhubaneswar to sanction the lease, but no such
information is provided relating thereto is nothing but a
speculative exercise. After observing thus, the revisional
authority goes on a tangent to hold that it is an attempt to
grab Government land through fraudulent means. Non-
production of the sanction of lease by the competent
authority and the order of the transfer of the case land
under Section 22 of the OLR Act has also been cited. With
such observations, the revisional authority has arrived at
the conclusion that the petitioner does not enjoy valid flow
of title over the case land.
9. For the reasons already indicated, the grounds so
cited to reject the petitioner’s claim can hardly be
countenanced in law. This Court is constrained to observe
that the revisional authority has exceeded its jurisdiction
by entering into areas not within its domain and described
the claim as fraudulent without any acceptable material or
evidence. The impugned order is therefore, rendered
unsustainable in law.
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10. For the foregoing reasons therefore, the Writ Petition
is allowed. The impugned orders passed in Objection Case
No. 576/203 dated 23.08.2013 and OSS Case No. 709 of
2020 dated 09.08.2024 are set aside. The Tahsildar, Jatni
is directed to cancel the finally published ROR issued in the
name of the State and issue a fresh ROR in the name of the
Petitioner in respect of the case land. The whole exercise
should be carried out within two months from the date of
production of certified copy of this order by the petitioner.
11. The other five writ applications, namely, W.P.(C) Nos.
2973, 3039, 4668, 5047 and 7634 of 2025, relate to
different portions of land claimed through the lease granted
in favour of Sura Naik under W.L.L. Case No. 2715 of 1973.
After obtaining permission under Section 22 of the OLR
Act, Sura Naik transferred portions of the leased land,
which have been subsequently purchased by the respective
petitioners in the aforesaid writ applications. As discussed
hereinabove, all these writ applications involve similar facts
and common questions of law. The reasons recorded
hereinabove shall, therefore, apply to these five writ
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applications as well. Accordingly, the impugned orders
challenged in the aforesaid writ applications are also set
aside. The Tahasildar, Jatni, is directed to cancel the finally
published RORs issued in the name of the State
Government and issue fresh RORs in favour of the
respective petitioners in respect of their respective case
lands. The entire exercise shall be completed within a
period of two months from the date of production of
certified copy of this order by the respective petitioners.
12. All the Writ Petitions are disposed of accordingly.
…………….………..…….
Sashikanta Mishra,
Judge
AKB
Signature Not Verified
Digitally Signed
Signed by: ASHOK KUMAR BEHERA
Reason: Authentication
Location: High Court of Orissa, Cuttack
Date: 16-Oct-2026 18:48:29
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