Summary
The Supreme Court set aside a District Revenue Officer’s substitution of a claimant’s name in land records because rectification powers did not authorise adjudication of disputed title. Patta entries were only prima facie evidence, with title disputes for the civil court. The claimant’s admitted acquisition by the State also extinguished the asserted earlier interest and defeated standing to seek rectification. Separate State proceedings to resume the land from its assignee remained open.
Issues
- Whether the revenue authority’s rectification power extended to deciding disputed ownership.
- Whether the claimant retained an interest after the acknowledged acquisition.
Provisions considered
- Section 6, Tamil Nadu Patta Pass Book Act, 1983Patta entries provide rebuttable prima facie evidence of title. (¶ 15)
- Sections 10 and 14, Tamil Nadu Patta Pass Book Act, 1983The modification process did not displace the civil-court remedy for rival title claims; the bar on specified suits against government was qualified by the declaratory-suit proviso. (¶¶ 16, 17, 19)
- Rule 4(4), Tamil Nadu Patta Pass Book Rules, 1987Ownership disputes within the rule require a competent civil-court determination before changing existing entries. (¶¶ 18, 19)
Held
- A combined reading of the statutory proviso and rules required rival ownership disputes to be resolved by a competent civil court, with revenue records then following its decree. The revenue officer could cure registry defects but not determine a mixed question of title under that guise. (¶¶ 17, 18, 19, 20)
- The claimant did not produce the asserted 1929 deed or establish the terms of the alleged oral lease. The State’s acquisition and assignment records, and the claimant’s own acceptance of acquisition, extinguished any asserted pre-existing interest and left no locus to seek the substitution before the revenue officer. (¶¶ 21, 22)
- The decision concerned the improper revenue-record order, not the merits of the State’s later show-cause notice proposing resumption from WSIL. All rights and contentions in that separate matter remained open. (¶¶ 11, 23)
Result
Appeals allowed; Division Bench judgment and District Revenue Officer’s order set aside, and Single Judge judgment restored. State resumption proceedings expressly left open. Contempt petition 1906/2017 and pending applications disposed of.