IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE, ANDHRA PRADESH AT HYDERABAD (Special Original Jurisdiction) MONDAY, THE TWENTY SECOND DAY OF SEPTEMBER TWO THOUSAND AND EIGHT PRESENT THE HON'BLE MR JUSTICE RAMESH RANGANATHAN WRIT PETITION NO : 15516 of 1999 Between: ..... PETITIONER AND .....RESPONDENT Petition under Article 226 of the constitution of India praying that in the circumstances stated in the Aﬃdavit ﬁled herein the High Court will be pleased to Counsel for the Petitioner:MR.VENKATESWARA RAO GUDAPATI Counsel for the Respondent No.: GP FOR ASSIGNMENT The Court made the following : THE HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE RAMESH RANGANATHAN WRIT PETITION No.15516 of 1999 ORDER: The relief sought for in this writ petition is to declare the action of the respondents in assigning Ac.21-88 cents of land in Sy.No.283 and 284 of Bireddipalem hamlet of Kancheru village in favour of respondents 7 to 17 as arbitrary and illegal and to direct the 1st respondent to conduct an enquiry and to assign the land to the petitioners and others who are landless poor and belong to S.C, S.T, and B.C. communities. The grievance of the petitioners is that an extent of Ac.21-88 cents was assigned to 8 persons on the order of the Joint Collector though the said decision was only at the behest of the Chairman of the Assignment Committee and the other members had not even aﬃxed their signatures to the said proceedings, that their representation to the authorities had fallen on deaf ears and though the land had to be assigned in the order of preference and requires ﬁrst preference to be given to the Scheduled Caste, Scheduled Tribe and Backward Classes, the land was assigned to the members of the forward community to which category respondents 7 to 17 belong. In the course of oral submissions, Sri G.Sai Narayana Rao, Learned Counsel appearing on behalf of Sri Venkateswara Rao Gudapati, Learned Counsel for the Petitioner, pointed out that while the unoﬃcial respondents had contended in their counter aﬃdavit that they belong to backward class, nonetheless, the requirement under the Board Standing Orders, as amended from time to time, is that the land should be given in a particular order of preference and, even if the unoﬃcial respondents are held to belong to the backward classes, it is only if the requirement of those who belong to Scheduled Caste, Scheduled Tribe and Scheduled Caste converted Christians are satisﬁed, can waste land at the disposal of the Government be given to other backward classes. It is not in dispute that the 1st petitioner died during the pendency of the present proceedings and his legal representatives have not been brought on record. The writ petition, therefore abates as against the ﬁrst petitioner. The dispute, therefore, can only be espoused by the 2nd petitioner. In the counter aﬃdavit ﬁled on behalf of respondents 7 to 17 it is stated that they all belong to the landless poor and that they are from the backward classes. It is their case that they had requested for assignment of land in Sy.Nos.283 and 284 of Kancheru village in their favour after evicting one Smt.K.Manga Tayaramma, that ‘D’ Form Pattas were prepared by the then Tahsildar and were handed over to them, that Sri S.Ramurthy of Bhogapuram who was a rich and inﬂuential person had managed to obtain benami pattas in favour of Scheduled Caste beneﬁciaries, that they had ﬁled a petition in the year 1989 contending that the assignment was benami and that the lands were under the physical possession of Sri S.Ramurthy, that basing on their representation the R.D.O. and others oﬃcials had visited and conducted a detailed enquiry with the neighbouring ryots and, on ascertaining that the M.R.O. had wrongly reported that the assignees were in possession and delivery receipts had been obtained to that eﬀect and since the assigned lands were under the benami possession and enjoyment of Sri S.Ramurthy, a show cause notice was issued to the benami Scheduled Caste persons and on receipt of their explanation, after aﬀording them a personal hearing, and on a local enquiry and veriﬁcation being conducted, the ‘D’ Form pattas issued to them earlier were cancelled on 31.5.1991 and possession of the said land was taken on 24.7.1991. The benami assignees preferred an appeal to the Joint Collector who conﬁrmed the order under appeal on 13.9.1992. W.P.No.12981 of 1992 ﬁled thereagainst was dismissed on 1.10.1992 leaving it open to the petitioners to ﬁle a revision. The revision preferred by them to the Commissioner was also dismissed on 23.9.1994. Thereafter, by order in W.P.No.21584 of 1994, this Court granted stay pending disposal of the revision before the government. Thereafter, vide G.O.Rt.No.1988 dated 13.12.1996, the Government dismissed the revision against which W.P.No.20101 of 1997 was ﬁled and the same was disposed of on 6.4.1998 directing the R.D.O. to conduct a fresh enquiry on the basis of the statements already recorded and, accordingly, the R.D.O. conducted a fresh enquiry on 20.7.1998 and 10.9.1998 and cancelled the ‘D’ form pattas issued to the petitioners herein on the ground that they were benami assignees. The appeal preferred by them to the Joint Collector was also dismissed. Questioning the same W.P.No.11846 of 1999 was ﬁled which, according to Sri T.Nageswara Rao, Learned Counsel for the Respondents, was also dismissed by this Court. In so far as assignment of land in favour of the benami scheduled caste persons is concerned, it is evident that cancellation of assignment on the ground that they were benamis of a rich and inﬂuential landlord, has attained ﬁnality. In the present writ petition also the petitioners do not claim that they be assigned lands and, according to the unoﬃcial respondents, they have not even submitted an application to the Assignment Committee in this regard. Their grievance is that land should not be assigned in favour of the unoﬃcial respondents herein since they do not fall within the order of preference. According to the unoﬃcial respondents the 4th respondent selected the beneﬁciaries who had Sivajmadar rights over the lands since a long time, as their names were also recorded as D-patta holders in Sy.No.283 and 284 and as the claim of the respondents 7 to 17 for assignment of these lands was long pending. Under the Board Standing Orders, the order of preference among landless applicants is detailed as under: G.O.Ms.No.223 Rev. dated 12.2.1964 “(10) Order of preference among the landless poor applicants:- (1) Among eligible landless poor applicants, preference shall be given to the people in the village where the lands are situated. G.O.Ms.No.1142, Rev. dated 18.6.1964 (2) Among landless poor applicants, preference shall be given to the persons who owns no land at all. As between a Sivoijamadar and a non-Sivoijamadar, the Sivoijamadar who has been in continuous occupation of the land as deﬁned in paragraph 3(2)(ii) above will get preference. A landless poor Sivoijamadar in cases of unobjectionable occupation shall get preference even as against a demolished soldier in respect of those lands which are not reserved for jawans. He shall not be dispossessed of the land provided he is eligible for its assignment, and provided he is not in occupation of any part of the land set a part for assignment to soldiers. (3) Preference shall be given to members of Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, Schedules Caste converted Christians and other back ward classes in the assignment of waste lands at the disposal of government, the existing order in the matter of preference to landless poor Sivoijamadars and political sufferers remaining unaffected.” It is evident therefrom that, among the landless poor persons, preference should be given to those who had no land at all. As between Sivoijamadars and non- sivoijamadars, the Sivoijamadars who are in continuous occupation of land are required to be given preference. The preference to S.C., S.T, S.C. converted Christians and B.Cs is subject to the preference granted to landless poor Sivoijamadars. In order to ascertain whether respondents 7 to 17 were Sivoijamadars or not, this Court, on 18.8.2008, directed production of the records. The matter thereafter underwent several adjournments on 26.8.2008, 6.9.2008, 12.9.2008 and 15.9.2008. However, the records have not been produced till date. The contention of the unoﬃcial respondents that they are Sivoijamadars, therefore, has gone un-rebutted. Since the order of preference is subject to the rights of landless poor ‘Sivoijamadars’, which the unoﬃcial respondents contend they are and which stands unrebutted in the absence of records being placed before this Court, the mere fact that they belong to the backward classes, and not the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes is of little consequence. It needs no reiteration that the rights of Sivoijamadars take preference over the rights of the aforementioned categories. The unoﬃcial respondents would also contend that the petitioners have been set up by Sri P.Rammaurty, after failing in the earlier proceedings, only to continue to retain possession of the land. I do not see any reason to examine this controversy, since the unoﬃcial respondents, who claim to be Sivoijamadars, have, undoubtedly, a right of preference over the scheduled castes and scheduled tribe applicants, under the above extracted Board Standing Orders. The plea that only the Chairman had signed the assignment proceedings, and not other members, even if true, does not necessitate interference, since the unoﬃcial respondents would, undoubtedly, have a right of preference. It is also brought to the notice of this Court that pattas were granted in their favour and they continued to be in possession of the land for the past more than a decade. Viewed from any angle the assignment granted in their favour does not necessitate interference in proceedings under Article 226 of the Constitution of India. The writ petition fails and is, accordingly, dismissed. No order as to costs. ___________ 22-9-2008 asp