1979 PLP 812 (CLC)

Burhanuddin Khattak for Petitioner. MUHAMMAD KHURSHID KHAN, J.‑This judgment will dispose of thirteen Writ Petitions Nos, 641 to 653 of 1979, which raise common questions of fact and law for decision and in which the respondents are the same. The petitions seek to challenge the validity of the orders passed by, the Revenue E. A: C., Charsadda, exercising the powers of Assistant Collector, First Grade, the Collector, Charsadda, the Additional Commissioner, Peshawar Division, Peshawar, and the Member, Board of Revenue, North West Frontier Province, on 18th October, 1972, 27th July, 1978, 29th January and 3rd July, 1979, respectively. The facts, so far as it is necessary to state them for the purposes of dealing with the points involved in these petitions, are few and simple. The petitioners in these cases were sued by Sikandar Hayat, Saadullah Khan and Zafrullah sons, and Mst. Zuhra Begum wife, of Rahimullah Khan, respondents 1 to 4, in the Court of Revenue E. A. C, Charsadda with the powers of Assistant Collector, First Grade, for the recovery of lease amount for Rabi and Kharif, 1970, as well as for ejectment from the land of which they were the lessees and which was situated in the area of village Chail, Tehsil Charsadda. There was a separate suit against each set of the petitioners. The suits were vigorously contested as a result of which a number of issues were framed in each case. It is unnecessary to notice here the entire pleadings of the parties or the issues which were framed by the trial Court with reference to those pleadings. Suffice it to say that the main dispute between the parties centered round the questions of the rate of lease amount and the costs of improvements alleged to have been effected by the lessee. The parties led evidence. in support of their respective contentions while a Commissioner was also appointed by the Court for the assessment of the costs of improvements. On consideration of the entire material before him, the Assistant Collector, by his judgment dated 18th of October, 1972, passed decrees in all the cases, for the recovery of lease amount at the rate alleged by the plaintiffs as well as for the ejectment of the defendants, of course the ejectment being conditional on payment of the costs of improvements as determined by the Commissioner. He directed further that the defendants could be ejected from the land any time on payment of compensation for the standing crop and that the plaintiffs were to make the deficiency in Court fee good within a month. The defendants filed thirteen separate appeals before the Collector, Charsadda, challenging the judgments and the decree passed by the Assistant Collector. The appeals failed and were dismissed with costs by the Collector on the 27th of July, 1978, observing, however, that "at the time of ejectment fresh improvement of land will be calculated, to which the ejectees will be entitled". These orders were challenged in revision before the Additional Commissioner, Peshawar Division, Peshawar, who on 29‑1‑1979 dismissed the revision petitions, leaving the parties to bear their own costs. The matter was then taken in Second revision before a Member, Board of Revenue, who by his consolidated order dated the 3rd of July, 1979, set aside the orders of the Additional Commissioner and the Collector, and restored those of the Assistant Collector dated 18‑10‑1972, in their entirety, leaving the parties to bear their own costs. Feeling aggrieved by the orders referred to above, the defendants lessees have moved the present writ petition to question the validity of the orders so passed. The grievance of the petitioners is that they never agreed to the enhanced rate of lease money as recorded in the relevant Khasra Girdawaris and accepted by the Revenue Courts; that there being a separate issue as to the costs of improvements, the Collector having partly accepted the appeals ought to have remanded the case to the trial Court for the settlement of the issue and for that matter, the Member Board of Revenue, was not competent to set aside the order of the Collector with regard to the appointment of a Commissioner to work out the compensation, and lastly that the plaintiffs? respondents 1 to 4, having not complied with the order of the trial Court for making the deficiency in Court for good within the prescribed period of one month, their suits were liable to dismissal. Mr. Burhanuddin Khattak, learned counsel for the petitioners, argued that the land had been leased out to the petitioners at the rate of Rs. 60, per Jarib per annum and that merely because the rate had been shown at Rs. 140 per Jarib per annum in the relevant Khasra Girdawaris was not sufficient to prove this fact with the result that the decisions of the Revenue Courts on the point were erroneous. He further said that the Collector, and for that matter, even the Courts sitting in revision, ought. to have remanded the case to the trial Court for the settlement of issue in regard to the costs of improvements by issuing a fresh Commission and this course having not been adopted, the entire proceedings stood vitiated. The last contention put forth by the learned counsel for the petitioners was that the plaintiffs having failed in making the deficiency in court‑fee good within the stipulated period of one month, their suits ought to have been dismissed, These infirmities, counsel for the petitioners submitted, constituted an act performed "without lawful authority" and, therefore, the High Court in it, writ jurisdiction was competent to interfere with it and to set it at naught, The argument, in our opinion, is not tenable. It could scarcely be controverted that the present was not a case of no evidence. It is, on the other hand, clear from the decisions impugned before us that both the parties led evidence in support of their respective allegations and the decisions of all the Revenue Courts proceeded on their appreciation of the said evidence. It is needless to say that Khasra Girdawari was also a piece of evidence and there is nothing in law which could prevent the Revenue Courts from relying on the entries recorded therein. It is also not controverted that it was within the jurisdiction of the Revenue Courts including that of the Member, Board of Revenue, to entertain the suits, appeals and Revisions in the present cases, and to decide the matters agitated before them. The fact that all the points now raised in these Writ Petitions, including the one having reference to the making up of the deficiency in court‑fee within a month, were taken by the petitioners before the Revenue Courts at one stage or the other and were decided against them is also not denied by the counsel for the petitioners. His grievance, however, is that the matter had been wrongly decided by those Courts, not only with reference to the facts of the cases, but also from the legal point of view. The learned counsel has, however, not been able to refer us to any material on the record to support his contention that the decisions were erroneous on matters of facts as well as matters of law. Assuming, however, for the sake of arguments that the decisions were erroneous as contended by the learned counsel, the petitioners are confronted with a further difficulty, and a formidable difficulty indeed, arising out of the use of the expression "without lawful authority and of no legal effect" in Article 199 (i)(a) (ii) of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. This expression undoubtedly refers to jurisdictional defects as distinguished from a mere erroneous decision on a point of fact or even of law. It is well settled that where a Court has jurisdiction and it determines the question in controversy between the parties, it cannot be said that it acted illegally, without jurisdiction or even with material irregularity, merely because came to an erroneous decision on a question of fact or even of law. The High Court, in exercise of its writ jurisdiction, is concerned only with the question whether the Court or any other authority had acted within its jurisdiction. There can be no doubt that a Court having jurisdiction to decide a matter is competent to decide it rightly or wrongly and the mere Fact that the decision is incorrect or erroneous on a question of fact or of law does not render the decision as "without lawful authority". Nor does the fact that the decision is wrong or erroneous render it without jurisdiction. It would be too much to say that the constitutional provision was aimed at, "''empowering the High Court to interfere with the decision of a Court or a Tribunal merely because in its opinion, the decision is incorrect. It is unnecessary to refer to all the authorities supporting this proposition, but we may refer to one, namely, in the case of Muhammad Hussain Munir and others v. Sikandar and others (P L D 1974 S C 139), where the Supreme Court adverted to this cardinal principle of late that the High Court, in its writ jurisdiction, was not empowered to interfere with the decision of a Court or Tribunal of inferior jurisdiction, merely because in its opinion the decision is wrong, and that to consider that the constitutional provision was designed to empower the High Court to interfere with such a decision would make the High Court's jurisdiction indistinguishable from that exerciseable in a full‑fledged appeal, which could not be the intention of the Constitution‑makers. This authority appears to us to be on all fours with the present case and we have no difficulty in holding that the law is expressed accurately and comprehensively in this authority. In view of this position, we hold that the writ jurisdiction of this Court cannot be stretched so as to cover the dispute involved in these petitions and which had been, ,the subject matter of litigation in the Revenue Courts. In view of the above discussion, all these petitions fail and are accordingly' dismissed in limine. S. A. H ?????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????? Petition dismissed.