Section 38A notifications require revenue-record verification and notice to recorded landowners.

The petitioner claimed ownership of 1 acre 38 guntas in Sy. No. 67/*/hissa* at Somalapur village, Sindhanur taluk.

Revenue records from 2022–23 reflected his ancestors’ names and, subsequently, the petitioner’s name up to the impugned notification.

The Deputy Commissioner issued a notification under Section 38A of the Karnataka Land Reforms Act, 1961, declaring the Venk atapura area an “unrecorded habitation”; the notification included the petitioner’s land.

The petitioner challenged the notification, alleging that the prescribed procedure had not been followed, and sought restoration of his name in the revenue records or, alternatively, acquisition and compensation.

1. Whether the Deputy Commissioner could include the petitioner’s land in a Section 38A notification declaring an “unrecorded habitation” without following the required procedure, including considering revenue records and notifying persons whose names appeared in them.

2. Whether the petitioner was entitled to have the notification set aside insofar as it concerned his land and to have his name restored in the relevant RTCs.

Section 38A of the Karnataka Land Reforms Act, 1961, was the statutory basis invoked for declaring an area an “unrecorded habitation”.

Relying on *Smt. Sonavva & Ors. v. State of Karnataka & Ors.*, W.P. No. 107338/2024, decided on 23 January 2025, the Court stated that the Deputy Commissioner must verify relevant revenue records before issuing a notification; where those records identify interested persons, notice must be issued to them, and where no such entries exist, the notification should record that fact.

The Court also invoked Article 300A of the Constitution, observing that deprivation of the petitioner’s ability to use and enjoy private land without acquisition raises a concern under that provision.

The revenue records showed the petitioner’s claimed interest in the land, but the Deputy Commissioner’s notification included it as part of the declared habitation without following the procedural safeguards identified in *Sonavva*.

The Court therefore found that the notification had been issued contrary to those requirements.

Because the land was treated as private agricultural land and the petitioner was deprived of the opportunity to use and enjoy it without acquisition, the Court concluded that the notification could not stand insofar as it concerned his land.

It directed respondent No. 3 to delete the Government’s name in respect of the land and restore the petitioner’s name in the relevant RTCs.

No order was made as to costs.