SC on Punjab law: Control, not title, vests with panchayat if land taken from proprietors

The SC passed the verdict on a batch of appeals against the full bench verdict of the high court that examined legality of a provision of the Punjab Village Common Lands Act

The SC bench clarified that vesting under Section 4 of the Punjab Village Common Lands Act would be limited to management and control of the land with panchayat. (Getty Images/iStockphoto)

The Supreme Court on Thursday held that in respect of the land taken from the proprietors from their permissible ceiling limits under a Punjab law, it is the management and control alone that would vest with the panchayat and not the title. The top court said that the management and control include leasing of land and use of the land by non-proprietors, Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, etc, which is for the benefit of the village community.

A bench of Justices Hemant Gupta and V Ramasubramanian passed the verdict on a batch of appeals against the full bench verdict of Punjab and Haryana high court that examined the legality of sub-section 6 of Section 2(g) of the Punjab Village Common Lands (Regulation) Act, 1961.

The bench, however, clarified that vesting under Section 4 of the Act would be limited to management and control of the land with panchayat. “It is pertinent to note here that for the land taken from the proprietors by applying pro rata cut from the permissible ceiling limits of the proprietors, management, and control alone vests with the panchayat but such vesting of management and control is irreversible and the land would not revert to the proprietors for redistribution as the common purposes for which land has been carved out not only include the present requirements but the future requirements as well,” the bench said in its 98-page verdict.

It said that such land would not be available for sale so as to confer the title on the purchaser in view of the fact that the panchayat is not the full owner of the land but while exercising control and management, it is duty-bound to safeguard the land for the benefit of the village community.

“The panchayat will not have title over the land but as part of management and control, the panchayat is at liberty to put the land for use for common purposes. Such common purposes as defined under Section 2(bb) of the 1948 Act are interchangeable and also can be used for any other common purpose. It is to be noted that common purposes are ever-evolving; they are not fixed in time,” the court said.

The bench said that with the change in time and expectations of the village community, common purposes have to be given wider meaning in view of the object of such reservation of land. “Therefore, though the panchayat has management and control in respect of the land which was carved out from the land falling within the ceiling limits, the panchayat would have complete control over the said part of the land. The word ‘vesting’ appearing in Section 4 has to be read down to mean that management and control of such land alone would vest in the Panchayat,” it said.

The bench said that though the land vests with the panchayat, such land should be utilised only for common purposes for the benefit of the village community. “Such benefits to the village community are not limited to traditional benefits of the village community, i.e. land for grazing of cattle, dumping of dead animals, schools and hospitals, but also the activities which would be required in future, keeping in view the modernisation of the village economy which will ultimately for the benefit of the village community,” said the apex court.