The Supreme Court on Monday while considering a civil appeal regarding a case of permanent injunction upheld the high court’s decision as the second appellate court and remarked “The High Court is not obliged to frame substantial question of law, in case, it finds no error in the findings recorded by the First Appellate Court.”
The Supreme Court bench of Justice L Nageswara Rao, Justice Hemant Gupta and Justice Ajay Rastogi passed the judgment in an appeal of a land dispute case which was going since 1971. The appellant was aggrieved by the civil court, first appellate court and high court’s decisions and challenged them on multiple grounds in the apex court.
The appellant’s counsel argued that civil court’s jurisdiction was barred since it was a dispute of boundary of the land between two villages and same was to be decided by the commissioner under the Delhi land revenue Act, 1954. The counsel contended against the decision of the first appellate court stating that it decided the appeal without dealing with the issue of jurisdiction which caused serious prejudice to the appellants.
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The counsel further submitted that the high court as the second appellant court also dismissed the appeal without formulating substantial question of law which was mandatory under section 100 of the civil procedure code.
The apex court found that both the civil court and the first appellant court did not cause any prejudice to the appellant in not deciding the issue of jurisdiction since it was decided by the first appellate court when it took upon the case and the civil court also didn’t treat it as a preliminary issue. The court further clarifying the issue of the civil court’s jurisdiction stated that “The Land Revenue Act does not expressly bar the jurisdiction of the Civil Court in respect of boundary disputes. The boundary disputes are between two revenue estates and does not include the demarcation of the land of the parties.” The court further stated that there was no provision in the land revenue act regarding grant of injunction in land dispute cases and civil court had plenary jurisdiction over such cases which were not barred under section 9 of the CPC.
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The court regarding the decision of the high court as the second appellate court stated that “we find that the High Court did not commit any illegality in not framing any substantial question of law while dismissing the appeal filed by the appellants” the Supreme court upholding the high court’s decision disregarded the appellant’s argument that the second appellant court had to form substantial question of law under section 100 of the CPC, the court said “the Court(High court) has the power to hear appeal on any other substantial question of law on satisfaction of the conditions laid down in the proviso of Section 100 of the Code. Therefore, if the substantial question of law framed by the appellants are found to be arising in the case, only then the High Court is required to formulate the same for consideration. If no such question arises, it is not necessary for the High Court to frame any substantial question of law. The formulation of substantial question of law or reformulation of the same in terms of the proviso arises only if there are some questions of law and not in the absence of any substantial question of law. The High Court is not obliged to frame substantial question of law, in case, it finds no error in the findings recorded by the First Appellate Court.” Thus finding no fault in the high court and lower court’s decisions the court dismissed the appeal and upheld high court’s order.
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