Disputed property title cannot be adjudicated in writ proceedings under Article 226.

The petitioner operated a lathe workshop and residence at the disputed property, using electricity service connection No. 027-001-1048.

The property’s ownership was contested: the petitioner’s husband had filed a pending civil suit concerning the property, and the fourth respondent claimed through a later sale deed from the husband’s first wife.

The petitioner alleged that the connection was disconnected at the fourth respondent’s instance and sought its restoration.

The first respondent refused, directing her to obtain appropriate orders from the competent court.

The petitioner challenged that decision under Article 226.

Whether the High Court could determine the parties’ competing rights to the property, and grant relief concerning the electricity connection, while title was disputed in pending civil proceedings.

Whether the first respondent’s refusal to restore the connection, pending an appropriate order or no-objection certificate from the person in whose name it stood, could be faulted.

Article 226 empowers the High Court to exercise writ jurisdiction, but the Court held that it could not examine evidence or adjudicate disputed questions of title, which fell within the competent Civil Court’s jurisdiction.

Where title to the premises was disputed and the matter was already before the Civil Court, the electricity authority’s direction to obtain a no-objection certificate from the person in whose name the service connection stood was not shown to be erroneous.

The Court noted that a suit concerning partition and permanent injunction was pending and that the fourth respondent’s title was also in issue in that suit.

Resolving the petitioner’s claim to possession or entitlement to the connection would require consideration of disputed title and evidence, which the Court declined to undertake in writ proceedings.

In that context, it found no basis to fault the electricity authority for requiring the petitioner to obtain the specified no-objection certificate.

There was no order as to costs.