Andhra Pradesh Land Grabbing (Prohibition) Act, 1982 – s.8(1) – Land grabbing – Appellant filing a land grabbing case against respondent under the 1982 Act – Allegation that respondent grabbed about 500 sq yards of land owned by appellants – Dismissal by the Special Court – Appellant had already filed couple of proceedings alleging encroachment and land grabbing before the civil court which were also dismissed – Writ petition against the Special court’s order also dismissed – On appeal, held: Appellants themselves approached the civil court and now they cannot submit that they approached the wrong forum – If the appellants believed that the civil court did not have jurisdiction to entertain the suit instituted by them, then the proper course of action would have been to withdraw the suits and proceed under the Act and not to pursue more proceedings – Appellants invited trouble either by pursuing the litigation in the wrong forum or by not approaching the right forum – For this, the appellants are themselves to be blamed and cannot hide behind the veil of a lack of jurisdiction of the civil court – Appellants were given a full-fledged hearing by the Special Court under the Act – Special court held that the appellants failed to establish that they are the owners of the schedule property; that the respondents had trespassed on the suit property without legal entitlement, thus, were land grabbers; and that there is no certainty about the land alleged to have been grabbed by the respondents – Appellants sought to rely upon a report given by the Local Commissioner appointed by the civil court which did not indicate much – Said report was not proved in evidence before the Special Court or even in the Suit – Moreso, the Local Commissioner was not examined with regard to the correctness of the report – Further, if the submission of the appellants that the suits instituted after 1982 are not maintainable, then even the report of the Local Commissioner is without jurisdiction – Thus, Special Court fully justified in dismissing the land grabbing case.
As published in the Supreme Court Reports, Supreme Court of India. Text from the Indian Supreme Court Judgments open data set (Dattam Labs), CC BY 4.0.
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