Case: Arjan Singh And Anr Vs. The State Of Punjab And Ors

Hegde, J. 1. Though several question of law were raised in this appeal by special leave, after hearing the Counsel for the parties on one of those questions, namely on what date Section 32-KK of the Pepsu Tenancy and Agricultural Lands Act 1955 (Act No. XIII of 1955) (to be hereinafter referred to as the Principal Act) should be deemed to have come into force, we did not think it necessary to hear the Counsel for the parties on the other questions raised in the Appeal. 2. Before examining the question of law referred to hereinbefore it is necessary to set out the material facts. 3. The second appellant is the son of the first appellant. The appellant along with Charanjit Singh and Darshan, the two others sons of the first appellant were members of a joint Hindu family. That family owned agricultural lands in the village Hathoa, Tehsil Malerkotla District Sangrur. The principal Act came into force on March 6, 1955. The preamble to that Act says that it is an Act to amend and consolidate the law relating to tenancies of agricultural lands and to provide for certain measures of land reforms. That Act provided that :"subject to the provisions of Section 5 every land owner owning land exceeding thirty standard acres shall be entitled to select for personal cultivation from the land held by him in the State as a land owner any parcel or parcels of land not exceeding in aggregate area the permissible limit and reserve such land for personal cultivation by intimating his selection in the prescribed form and manner to the Collector." The permissible limit is thirty standard acres. Under that Act, there was no provision for Government taking over the lands that were in excess of the permissible limit. The appellants family divided their family properties as per a registered partition deed on September 6, 1956. Thereafter necessary changes in the mutation register were made. The principal Act was amended in 1956 as per Amendment Act 15 of 1956 which came into force on October 30, 1956. That Act incorporated into the principal Act Chapter 4-A which provides for Government taking over the surplus lands in the hands of a land-owner i.e., the lands in excess of the permissible limit. After the amendment came into force, it appears several alienations were effected by the land owners to get out of the reach of the law. Neither the principal Act nor the Amendment effected in 1956 prohibited any alienation. Then came the Pepsu Tenancy and Agricultural Lands (Amendment) Act, No. III of 1959 which was made operative from January 19, 1959. Among other provisions that Amendment Act incorporated into the Act Sec. 32-FF which says :"Save in the case of land acquired by the State Government under any law for the time being in force or by an heir by inheritance or upon 30th July 1958 by a landless person or a small landowner not being a relation as prescribed of the person making the transfer or disposition of land, for consideration upto an area which with or without the area owned or held by him does not in the aggregate exceed the permissible limit, no transfer or other disposition of land effected after 21st August, 1956, shall affect the right of the State Government under this Act to the surplus area to which it would be entitled but for such transfer or disposition." This section has a proviso which reads :"Provided that any person who has received any advantage under such transfer or disposition of land shall be bound to restore it, or to make compensation for it to the person from whom he received it." In 1962 the Pepsu Tenancy and Agricultural Lands (Amendment and Validation) Act No. XVI of 1962 was passed. It came into force on July 20, 1962. Two sections in that Act which are relevant for our present purpose are Sections 7 and 1. Section 7 reads."Insertion of new Section 32-KK in Pepsu Act 13 of 1955. - After Section 32-K of the principal Act, the following section shall be inserted, namely :- 32-KK. Land owned by Hindu undivided family to be deemed land of one landowner. - Notwithstanding anything contained in this Act or in any other law for the time being in force; - (a) where, immediately before the commencement of this Act, a landowner and his descendants constitute a Hindu undivided family the land owned by such family shall, for the purposes of this Act, be deemed to be the land of that land owner and no descendant shall, as member of such family, be entitled to claim that in respect of his share of such land he is a land-owner in his own right; and (b) a partition of land owned by a Hindu undivided family referred to in clause (a) shall be deemed to be a disposition of land for the purposes of Section 32-FF." Explanation :- In this section, the expression "descendant" includes an adopted son." Section 1 sets out the short title and commencement of the Act. That Section reads :"This Act may be called that Pepsu Tenancy and Agricultural Lands (Amendment and Validation) Act, 1962. (2) Section 2, Section 4, Section 5, Section 7 and Section 10 shall be deemed to have come into force on the 30th day of October, 1956 and the remaining provisions of this Act shall come into fore at once." After the Pepsu Tenancy and Agricultural Lands (Amendment) Act No. III of 1959 came into force, the Collector of Sangrur started proceedings under Chapter 4A of the Act for determining the surplus lands in the hands of the appellants. In those proceedings despite the representations of the appellant, the Collector ignored the partition effected in the family of the appellant in determining the surplus land in the hands of the members of the family. He considered them as one unit and on that basis held that eighteen standard acres and 5 1/2 units of lands are surplus in their hands. There is no dispute that if the partition entered into in the family had been taken into consideration, the lands held by the different sharers are within permissible limit. The appellant unsuccessfully went up in appeal against that order to the Commissioner Patiala Division. Against the order of the Commissioner, the appellants appealed to the State Government but that appeal was rejected on September 11, 1961. Thereafter the appellants filed Civil Writ No. 1418 of 1961 in the High court of Punjab at Chandigarh under Article 226 of the Constitution challenging the decisions of respondents 1 to 3. The learned Single Judge who heard that petition dismissed the same on November 27, 1962. He held that as Section 32-KK had become a part of the principal Act the words "this Act" in that section must refer to the principal Act and not to Section 7 of the Amendment Act. The decision of the learned Single Judge was affirmed by a Division Bench of that Court. That bench followed an earlier decision of that Court in Bir Singh v. State of Punjab (1963) 65 Pun LR 961 = AIR 1964 Punj 30). At this stage we may mention that in the Punjab High Court at one stage there were conflicting decisions on the question of law under consideration. It is not necessary to refer to those decisions as grounds on which they differed are referred to in Bir Singhs case (supra). The decisions which have taken the same view as taken by the High Court in this case have ignored the significance of Section 1 (2) of the 1962 Amendment Act. They have exclusively focussed their attention on Section 32-KK and the supposed reasons for its enactment. 4. It is a well-settled rule of construction that no provision in a statute should be given retrospective effect unless the legislature by express terms or by necessary implication has made it retrospective and that were a provision is made retrospective, case should be taken not to extend its retrospective effect beyond what was intended. 5. To accept the line of reasoning adopted by learned Judge of the High Court who decided this case is to completely ignore sub-section (2) of Section 1 of the 1962 Amendment Act. That Section in specific terms says that Section 32-KK (Section 7 of the Amendment Act) shall be deemed to have come into force on the 30th day of October 1956. We fail to see how we can ignore this mandate of the legislature. That provision clearly brings out the intention of the legislature. There is no ambiguity in it. It is not possible to adopt any rule of construction which would necessitate the Court to ignore that provision. It is not possible to accept the conclusion of the High Court that Section 32-KK must be deemed to have come into force on the date the principal Act came into force, namely, on March 6, 1955. That is not even the case of the respondents.Clause (b) of Section 32-KK which is the clause relevant for our present purpose would be a meaningless provision unless the same in read along with Section 32-FF which was for the first time incorporated into the principal Act in 1959 though it affects all transfers and other dispositions of land effected after August 21, 1956. It is not the cane of the respondents that the transfers effected or the partitions made before August 21, 1956 are within the mischief of Section 32-FF or Section 32-FF read with Section 32-KK. Therefore there is no basis for saying that Section 32-KK has been given retrospective effect as from the date principal Act came into force. 6. On a reading of the various provisions of the Pepsu Tenancy and Agricultural lands (Amendment and Validation) Act 1962, it appears to us that the legislature intended that Section 7 of that Act which introduced into the principal Act Section 32-KK should be deemed to have come into force on the 30th October 1956.Evidently the draftsman when he drafted Section 7 of that Act had in his mind the Amendment Act and not the principal Act. The words "this Act" in Section 7 of the Amendment Act (Section 32-KK of the principal Act) in our opinion were intended to refer to the Amendment Act and not to the principal Act. It is true that ordinarily when a Section is incorporated into the principal Act by a means of an amendment, reference in that Section to "this Act" means the principal Act.But in view of sub-section (2) of Section 1 of the Amendment Act of 1962 that construction has become impermissible. Every statute has to be construed as a whole and the construction given should be a harmonious one.It may be that the legislature intended that Section 32-KK should be deemed to have come into force on the 30th day of October, 1956, on which day Section 32-FF became a part of the principal Act.It is possible that the legislature did not intend to give to that Section the same retrospective effect as it had given to Section 32-FF. It is not permissible for us to proceed on the basis that the legislature had enacted sub-section (2) of Section 1 of the Amendment Act 1962 by oversight. If any mistake had crept into that Section it is for the legislature to correct the same and it is not for this Court to proceed on the supposition that the same was enacted by oversight.

Decision reasoning: 1[ds]After the Pepsu Tenancy and Agricultural Lands (Amendment) Act No. III of 1959 came into force, the Collector of Sangrur started proceedings under Chapter 4A of the Act for determining the surplus lands in the hands of the appellants. In those proceedings despite the representations of the appellant, the Collector ignored the partition effected in the family of the appellant in determining the surplus land in the hands of the members of the family. He considered them as one unit and on that basis held that eighteen standard acres and 5 1/2 units of lands are surplus in their hands. There is no dispute that if the partition entered into in the family had been taken into consideration, the lands held by the different sharers are within permissible limit. The appellant unsuccessfully went up in appeal against that order to the Commissioner Patiala Division. Against the order of the Commissioner, the appellants appealed to the State Government but that appeal was rejected on September 11, 1961. Thereafter the appellants filed Civil Writ No. 1418 of 1961 in the High court of Punjab at Chandigarh under Article 226 of the Constitution challenging the decisions of respondents 1 to 3. The learned Single Judge who heard that petition dismissed the same on November 27, 1962. He held that as Section 32-KK had become a part of the principal Act the words "this Act" in that section must refer to the principal Act and not to Section 7 of the Amendment Act4. It is a well-settled rule of construction that no provision in a statute should be given retrospective effect unless the legislature by express terms or by necessary implication has made it retrospective and that were a provision is made retrospective, case should be taken not to extend its retrospective effect beyond what was intended5. To accept the line of reasoning adopted by learned Judge of the High Court who decided this case is to completely ignore sub-section (2) of Section 1 of the 1962 Amendment Act. That Section in specific terms says that Section 32-KK (Section 7 of the Amendment Act) shall be deemed to have come into force on the 30th day of October 1956. We fail to see how we can ignore this mandate of the legislature. That provision clearly brings out the intention of the legislature. There is no ambiguity in it. It is not possible to adopt any rule of construction which would necessitate the Court to ignore that provision. It is not possible to accept the conclusion of the High Court that Section 32-KK must be deemed to have come into force on the date the principal Act came into force, namely, on March 6, 1955. That is not even the case of the respondents.Clause (b) of Section 32-KK which is the clause relevant for our present purpose would be a meaningless provision unless the same in read along with Section 32-FF which was for the first time incorporated into the principal Act in 1959 though it affects all transfers and other dispositions of land effected after August 21, 1956. It is not the cane of the respondents that the transfers effected or the partitions made before August 21, 1956 are within the mischief of Section 32-FF or Section 32-FF read with Section 32-KK. Therefore there is no basis for saying that Section 32-KK has been given retrospective effect as from the date principal Act came into force6. On a reading of the various provisions of the Pepsu Tenancy and Agricultural lands (Amendment and Validation) Act 1962, it appears to us that the legislature intended that Section 7 of that Act which introduced into the principal Act Section 32-KK should be deemed to have come into force on the 30th October 1956.Evidently the draftsman when he drafted Section 7 of that Act had in his mind the Amendment Act and not the principal Act. The words "this Act" in Section 7 of the Amendment Act (Section 32-KK of the principal Act) in our opinion were intended to refer to the Amendment Act and not to the principal Act. It is true that ordinarily when a Section is incorporated into the principal Act by a means of an amendment, reference in that Section to "this Act" means the principal Act.But in view of sub-section (2) of Section 1 of the Amendment Act of 1962 that construction has become impermissible. Every statute has to be construed as a whole and the construction given should be a harmonious one.It may be that the legislature intended that Section 32-KK should be deemed to have come into force on the 30th day of October, 1956, on which day Section 32-FF became a part of the principal Act.It is possible that the legislature did not intend to give to that Section the same retrospective effect as it had given to Section 32-FF. It is not permissible for us to proceed on the basis that the legislature had enacted sub-section (2) of Section 1 of the Amendment Act 1962 by oversight. If any mistake had crept into that Section it is for the legislature to correct the same and it is not for this Court to proceed on the supposition that the same was enacted by oversight.