MUMBAI: The Bombay High Court on Wednesday struck down orders passed by revenue authorities, deleting the name of construction firm owner Meena Rizvi from the records of a prime piece of land at Hill Road in Bandra West. Following a high court decree, a single judge bench of justice Kamal Khata ordered that her name be restored on the property card of the 1,067-sq.m plot.
The court’s order follows a petition filed by Rizvi, who owns Meena Constructions, challenging the orders passed by the Superintendent of Land Records on May 14, 2009, deleting her name from the property card of the plot. She had approached the state after the deputy director of land records dismissed her appeal and upheld the superintendent’s order. The state government too rejected her plea on November 30, 2011, prompting her to approach the high court.
Rizvi told the high court that in 1979 she had purchased the plot of land from the legal heirs of the land owner for ₹1.7 lakh and had paid an advance of ₹17,000. After the legal heirs failed to complete the transaction and convey the plot to her, she filed a civil suit in the high court.
She said that during the suit both parties resolved their issues amicably and on November 5, 1985 the high court passed a consent decree, one that ends a case without a trial following a mutual settlement. She added that the decree was registered in July 2007. At the time, the city survey officer at Bandra entered Rizvi’s name in the property card of the plot even though Benedict Soares, someone claiming to be a lessee of the property, objected to the matter.
Acting on an appeal filed by Soares, the superintendent of land records, set aside the change of land ownership and ordered the deletion of Rizvi’s name from the property card. The orders were then upheld by the deputy director of land records and the state government.
When Rizvi filed a petition against the removal of her name, it was opposed by Soares who claimed that the legal heirs had no title to the property and therefore could not have sold it to Rizvi. The high court however rejected his objections.
The court noted that the earlier consent decree had not been challenged nor was it set aside by any competent court. “Once a decree of a civil court attains finality and is registered in accordance with law, the revenue authorities are duty bound to take cognizance of it,” justice Khata said. “They cannot sit in appeal over such decree, re-examine its legality, or test the merits of the underlying transaction by questioning the correctness of the findings recorded,” the court added.
The court said the orders revealed that the revenue authorities had gone beyond their jurisdiction by elaborately examining Rizi’s title, the validity of succession of the land in question, the authority of the land’s owners, the alleged prohibitory orders against Rizvi, and the legality of the court’s consent decree.
The court held that these actions were “plainly impermissible” in such cases, and struck down the orders passed by the revenue authorities. The court has now directed the city survey officer, Bandra to restore Rizvi’s name in the property card of the prime plot in four weeks.
The court said it is not up to revenue authorities to examine the contention that the consent decree was no longer valid because it came out of a sale agreement by people who allegedly lacked the appropriate title. “Whether the decree is valid, void or voidable is a matter for a competent civil court. Revenue authorities cannot declare a civil court decree to be ineffective,” the court added.