Karnataka HC Directs Revenue Entries For Family Claiming Land Under 1954 Sale Deeds, Dismisses Rival Petition

In brief

The question

1. Whether the Deputy Commissioner’s order setting aside the Assistant Commissioner’s 2018 order could stand, given the petitioners’ claim under the registered sale deeds and the failure to consider that claim.

The court held

The Court allowed W.P. No. 20308 of 2021 and dismissed W.P. No. 13954 of 2025.

It also directed

It quashed the Deputy Commissioner’s order dated 24 February 2021 insofar as it set aside the Assistant Commissioner’s order dated 1 August 2018, confirmed the Assistant Commissioner’s order, and directed the Tahsildar to make the corresponding revenue entries in favour of the petitioners in W.P. No. 20308 of 2021 within two months of receiving a certified copy of the judgment.

01Facts

The petitioners in W.P. No. 20308 of 2021 claimed the land through registered sale deeds dated 16 September 1954 executed in favour of their father, Chikkegowda.

pp. 7–11

The petitioners in the connected petition claimed rights based on alleged unauthorised occupation and a Form No. 53 application.

pp. 7–11

In 1993, the Assistant Commissioner had set aside a grant concerning the land following proceedings initiated by villagers, without impleading the grantees or persons claiming through them.

pp. 7–11

The Assistant Commissioner later allowed R.A. No. 220 of 2015 on 1 August 2018; on 24 February 2021, the Deputy Commissioner set that order aside and directed that the land be recorded as Government land.

pp. 7–11

The rival claimants challenged the Deputy Commissioner’s order in the two writ petitions.

pp. 7–11

02Issues

i.1. Whether the Deputy Commissioner’s order setting aside the Assistant Commissioner’s 2018 order could stand, given the petitioners’ claim under the registered sale deeds and the failure to consider that claim.

pp. 12–14

ii.2. Whether the 1993 order, made in proceedings to which the grantees or their successors were not parties, established that the petitioners’ claimed rights under the sale deeds had been extinguished.

pp. 11–12

03Law Applied

The Court considered the Assistant Commissioner’s jurisdiction under Section 128 of the Karnataka Land Revenue Act, 1964, in relation to the revenue-record claim.

p. 12

It treated the registered sale deeds as the basis of the petitioners’ asserted rights and held that proceedings brought without impleading the concerned grantees or persons claiming through them could not, by themselves, determine or extinguish those asserted rights.

pp. 11–12

The judgment mentions Shivalingamma and Others v. Ashraya Yojana Committee, Huliyur Durga Constituency, ILR 2002 KAR 495, as authority cited by the petitioners; it does not independently apply or analyse that decision.

p. 8

Provisions in the judgment · 1

Karnataka Land Revenue Act, 1964 Section 128

04Reasoning

The Court found that the Deputy Commissioner had directed entry of the Government’s name without properly considering the petitioners’ claim founded on the 1954 registered sale deeds.

pp. 12–14

It also held that the 1993 order, made in proceedings where the concerned grantees and their successors were not parties, could not be treated as determinative of the title claimed under those deeds.

pp. 11–12

Since the Assistant Commissioner had considered the claim and the Deputy Commissioner had not appropriately addressed the asserted private ownership, the Court found the Deputy Commissioner’s interference with the 2018 order erroneous.

pp. 12–15