MUHAMMAD MUZAMMAL KHAN, J. --- This judgment proposes to decide five Constitutional petitions i.e. The one in hand and the others W.P. Nos. 13327/2006 to 13330/2006, as these raise similar questions of law/facts; require similar determination and are directed 'against same set of respondents. All the writ petitioners claim that they are allottees in possession of Provincial Government land under the Temporary Lease Scheme since 1989. According to them, lands in their possession were uncultivable/Bunjar Qadeem and were made cultivable by them by incurring/spending huge expenses/time. All of the writ petitioners complained that they had moved their respective applications for conferment of proprietary right of the lands in their possession, against prevalent market price under the scheme announced by the Government of Punjab. They further asserted that land in their possesson were not reserved for "Charagah" and entries to this effect in the revenue record are fake, without there being any mutation. According to them, these lands being in ownership of the Punjab Government, petitioners have a vested right of purchase but the same is being declined, out of discrimination and colourful exercise of powers. A direction in Constitutional jurisdiction of this Court was prayed to be issued for expeditious disposal of their applications already pending with the District Officer (Revenue), Bhakkar.
2. Having heard the case and perused the record, it became apparent that stance canvassed in these petitions rested On disputed factual controversy, requiring determination through detailed inquiry/recording of evidence but such exercise cannot be undertaken while discharging jurisdiction under Article 199 of the Constitution of this country. These canons have already attained finality through consistent 'judgments of the.
Hon`ble Supreme Court of Pakistan, right from the .Case of The Province of East Pakistan v. Kshiti Dhar Roy and others (PLD 1964 SC 636) up-to date, including the case of Muhammad Younas Khan and 12 others v. Government of N.W.F.P. Through Secretary, Forest and Agrilculture, Peshawar and others (1993 SCM R 618). Inspite of this Constitutional handicap, it is obvious that respondent No. 1 is a statutory functionary and his sphere of authority is fixed by a framework given by law, under which he is working. It is not imaginable that respondent No. 1 will flout his statutory obligations by refusing to decide the application of the petitioners in accordance with law. This is minimum that a citizen expects from a statutory functionary that any cause brought before him shall be expeditiously decided by him, one way or the other, according to the law applicable accordingly direct respondent No. 1 to decide applications of the petitioners already pending with him, strictly in accordance with law, within a period of two months. With these observations, all the writ petitions are disposed of.