Karnataka HC Orders Family’s Revenue Entries Restored For 1 Acre 15 Guntas, Quashing PTCL Resumption Order Over Unexamined 43-Year Gap

The subject land, measuring 2 acres, was granted in 1946–47 and conveyed by registered sale deed in 1969.

The purchaser gifted it to Rangappa and Hanumanthaiah in 1985; in 2000, the donees sold 25 guntas to respondent No. 6.

PTCL Act resumption proceedings were initiated in 2012.

The Assistant Commissioner dismissed the claim, but the Deputy Commissioner allowed the appeal and ordered resumption.

The petitioners challenged the Deputy Commissioner’s order, including on the ground of delay and laches.

Petitioners’ counsel did not press prayer (a).

The Court applied the PTCL Act in considering the resumption proceedings and the principle that delay and laches are material to the exercise of resumption powers.

It referred to a Division Bench clarification that laches should be treated as a primary consideration in resumption matters and that restoration proceedings brought after significant delay may be barred by laches.

The judgment identifies no specific statutory section or cited precedent.

The Court noted that resumption proceedings began approximately 43 years after the 1969 sale and 33 years after the PTCL Act came into force.

The Deputy Commissioner had failed to consider this delay despite the petitioners’ specific objection, or to assess the successive transactions and the settled nature of the rights arising from them.

Because delay and laches were material to whether resumption could be ordered, the failure to address them rendered the Deputy Commissioner’s order unsustainable.

It issued a writ of certiorari, quashed the order dated 21 June 2024, and directed the concerned authority to effect mutation and restore the petitioners’ names in the revenue records for 1 acre 15 guntas.

The writ petition was allowed.