Taluk Land Board's Determination Has Evidentiary Value In Proceedings Under Kerala Private Forest Vesting Act : Supreme Court

The Supreme Court has observed that determination arrived by the Land Board about the character of lands, under the Kerala Land Reforms Act, 1963 ("KLR Act") becomes a piece of evidence for the purposes of the Kerala Private Forests (Vesting and Assignment) Act, 1971 ("Vesting Act").The bench of Justices Indira Banerjee and S Ravindra Bhat in the present matter was dealing with a special leave petition assailing Kerala High Court's order by which the Court held that an area of slightly over 402 acres vested in the State of Kerala and the rest of the land of a total of 1534.40 acres had to be treated as plantation and thus belonged to Popular Estates.While dismissing the appeal, the bench in State Of Kerala & Anr. V. M/S Popular Estates (Now Dissolved) & Anr. relied on Popular II (State of Kerala v. Popular Estates, (2004) 12 SCC 434) , State of Kerala v. Mohammed Basheer (2019) 2 SCC 260 and Kunjanam Antony v. State of Kerala (2003) 3 SCC 221 on the aspect of giving weightage to the Taluk Land Board's order.It thus opined that, "the enunciation of the principle that "unless a contrary state of affairs" were shown to exist, the Board's order "would have to be given due weight" had to apply, and was correctly invoked by the High Court."The bench also observed that the Top Court would not interfere with the High Court's findings under Article 136 if there exists facts on records based on which two plausible views of conclusion can be drawn.Factual Background Popular Estates ("Respondent") became owner of 1534.40 acres of land upon partition of assets of M/S Popular Automobiles. After the validity of Vesting Act was affirmed by the Top Court in 1973, the forest authorities attempted to take possession of large areas of land occupied by Popular Estates, arguing that they were private forests and had vested in the state, under the Act. Although Popular Estates moved two Original Applications before the Forest Tribunal u/s 8 of the Act claiming a declaration that no part of the estate consisting 1534.40 acres was liable to vest in the state but the same were dismissed by the Tribunal. After orders of the tribunal, forest authorities attempted to take possession of the land. In the meanwhile, the state also issued notification notifying 100 hectares of the respondent estate as private forest, based on a survey undertaken by the forest department. Popular Estates filed two appeals impugning the tribunal's orders, before the High Court but the same and even the special leave petition against those orders were dismissed. The respondent then filed civil suits claiming that the state be permanently injuncted from taking possession. Initially, the civil court refused to register the plaint on grounds of maintainability, later, the suits were entertained on the intervention of the High Court in civil revision.On 22.7.1987, the Custodian and Conservator of Vested Forests issued a notification u/s 6 of the Vesting Act demarcating 324 hectares of land belonging to Popular Plantation as vested forests under the Vesting Act. Popular Estates challenged the same before the Tribunal. Holding that in its earlier order it had only dealt with the status of 100 hectares of the land and, therefore, with regard to the rest of the land the State was empowered to issue a fresh notification, the Tribunal dismissed the original applications.The same was challenged before the High Court by the Respondent. Holding the notification to be valid only in respect of 100 hectares of vested forest, the High Court allowed Respondent's appeal. It was held that there was no vesting so far as the rest of the land was concerned. The High Court also directed the Custodian of Vested Forests to demarcate the boundaries of the certain extent under Section 6 of the Vesting Act and restore possession of the remaining extent of the properties to Popular Plantation. Aggrieved, the State approached the Top Court and the Top Court November 4, 2004 (State of Kerala v. Popular Estates, (2004) 12 SCC 434/ Popular II) remanded the matter back to the tribunal. While adjudicating the appeal, the Court noticed that the High Court had proceeded on the basis that the order made by the Taluk Land Board in a land ceiling case pertaining to Popular Plantation would amount to res judicata. As per Rule 10 of the Kerala Land Reforms (Ceiling) Rules, 1970, the Taluk Land Board prepared a draft statement of lands to be surrendered and serve copies of such drafts on persons interested in the lands. The same was framed under the provisions of Kerala Land Reforms Act, 1963. In the draft statement prepared by the Taluk Land Board , Popular Estates was shown to hold an extent of 1576-73-257 acres of land, of which 1537-25-645 acres fell under the exempted category, and that Popular Estates was eligible to retain the balance extent within the ceiling area. The Board concluded that there was no surplus land to be surrendered to the state. The state government did not challenge the...

Taluk Land Board's Determination Has Evidentiary Value In Proceedings Under Kerala Private Forest Vesting Act : Supreme Court

Shruti Kakkar

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