P L D 1962 W (PLP)

At the very outset a pertinent question has been raised as to whether this petition can at all be treated as one in revision. It is not an application under section 17 of the Colonisation of Government Lands Act because the provisions of this section are wholly restricted to exchanges of tenants holdings with State land and do not apply to exchange of State land with proprietary area. This question once came up before the Financial Commis sioner in 1930 and the case is reported in P L D 1950 Ph. (Rev.)

73. The Financial Commissioner in this case made the following observations: ‑ (i) "I am of opinion that Government is not bound by any restrictions in the disposal of unallotted Crown waste. Any instructions it may lay down for the disposal of such waste are purely administrative instructions for the guidance of its subordinate officers. It follows that no third party has any locus standi whereby to appeal against an order allowing Crown waste and to admit such an appeal or a revision arising out of such an appeal, in which the Crown is impleaded as respondent would be to admit the claims of a third party as of right to control Government in the allotment of unallotted Crown land. I, therefore, as Chief Revenue Court and acting in my judicial capacity decline to accept the revision. (ii) I observe that there would be no objection to the residents of the village petitioning Government or any officer of Govern ment with the request that they should exercise the discretion of Government in a particular way. But such a petition would be entirely distinct from an appeal or application for revision made in the Courts of Commissioner or the Financial Com missioner acting in their judicial capacity." An appeal or a revision must be governed by some relevant statutory provision and the right to file them cannot be invoked without a recognised legal basis. I have no doubt that the petition before me can only be treated as a miscellaneous applica tion on the administrative side, and I dispose of it as such. The petitioners now object to the joint application on the ground that the signatures of village Abadkars thereon were obtained by fraud without their knowing what the application was about. But ft is strange that they took nearly two years to discover this fraud whereas the exchange was given effect to immediately following the sanction of the Collector. It seems to me too late in the day to go back on it and to secure the cancellation of the exchange from a Revenue Officer. The res pondent has been in possession of the exchanged land for more than two years and if it is now felt by any party that the sanction of the Collector was obtained by fraudulent means, the proper forum for him to go to would be the Civil Court and not a Revenue Court. On the question of propriety or otherwise of the exchange, I do not agree with the petitioners that it operates to the dis advantage of either the village residents or the Government. So far as the latter is concerned, It is admitted that the two lands are more or less of the same quality and value and the Govern ment has suffered no disadvantage from the exchange. As regards the village people, the Collector allowed the consolidation of the charagah lands on their own request and, quite obviously, to their convenience. Holding, therefore, that the petition is incompetent as a revision application and that the exchange sanctioned by the Collector cannot be called in question either on technical or on general grounds, I would dismiss it. A. H. Application dismissed.