NASIR ALSAM ZAHID, J-----This judgment will govern connected Civil Appeals Nos.181 of 1983 and 182 of 1983. The appellants in these two appeals are the same, namely, Lal Khan and Boota. They have claimed better right over the lands in question as informers in preference to private respondents in these appeals who have been allotted the same lands as claimants against their balance units.
2. We encountered great difficulty in the hearing of these appeals as apart from the memo of Writ Petitions fled by the private respondents and the impugned judgment of the High Court copies of no other documents have been filed. A question which arose in these appeals was whether only one appellant had filed the Mukhbari application or it had been filed on behalf of the other appellant also. There is also a dispute about the disposal of the Mukhbari application as, according to the High Court "admittedly the Mukhbari application was consigned to record" and the proceedings on that application ended there, whereas according to the appellants the proceedings which led to the detection of illegally allotted lands were based on the Mukhbari application. Copies of the mukhbari application and of orders passed on such application have not been brought on record. Copies of the various orders passed by the Settlement Authorities have also not been filed and brought on record. Leave was granted to the appellants by order dated 3- 4-1983 and it is apparent that no effort at all has been made on behalf of the appellants to get the record completed to enable this Court to decide this matter on merits to its complete satisfaction.
There is a clear non-compliance of Order 14 of the Supreme Court Rules, 1980. In the circumstances, these appeals are liable to dismissal for non-completion of the record.
3. However, with whatever scanty record that is available, we are of the view that on merits also no case has been made out for interference in the impugned orders of the High Court.
4. One Mst. Fazal Bibi was allotted 709 P.I. Units in village Kotli Hasham, Tehsil Mailsi, District Multan.
On 10-8-1962, one Muhammad Anwar, who has not been a party in the proceedings, acting as attorney of appellant No.1, Lal Khan, filed a Mukhbari application against Mst. Fazal Bibi alleging that she was holding the entire estate of her late husband Muhammad Ali whereas she was entitled to only 1/4th share in the estate. It was prayed in the Mukhbari application that the allotment over and above her entitlement be cancelled and the land thus made available be allotted to the informers.
There is a dispute as to whether the Mukhbari application was filed on behalf of Lal Khan or on behalf of other informers also. According to the impugned judgment of the High Court dated 22-9- 1976, Mukbari application had been filed by Muhammad Anwar as attorney of the appellant No.1 only. As neither the copy of the mukhbari application nor the various orders passed by the Settlement Authorities have been brought on record, it is assumed that the Mukhbari application had been filed on behalf of the appellant Lal Khan only as observed by the High Court. On the Mukhbari application, the Settlement Officer exercising the powers of the Deputy Rehabilitation Commissioner directed the Settlement Authorities to look into the matter for determining who were the legal heirs of deceased Muhammad Ali. Copy of this order has not been placed on record.
According to the High Court judgment, the Mdkhbari application was consigned to record and whatever proceedings commenced on that application stood terminated and as such the role of the appellants as informers came to an end and subsequent proceedings were entirely different.
From the judgment of the High Court, it appears that thereafter another application was filed by the same Muhammad Anwar on behalf of his father and uncle alleging thereby that they were the legal heirs of Muhammad Ali and as such they should be impleaded as a party to the enquiry.
Muhammad Anwar himself appeared as a witness in the enquiry. In the enquiry it was found that Mst. Fazal Bibi was entitled to 1/4th of estate of her deceased husband and the excess allotment was accordingly cancelled from her name by the Chairman Allotment Committee by order dated 16-5-1966. The private respondents were allottees of land in Village Kambar, Tehsil Mailsi, where they had some balance units available. These had been transferred to village Kotli Hasham and the area cancelled from the name of Mst. Fazal Bibi was allotted to the private respondents by the Allotment Committee on the same date i.e. 16-5-1966. Against the said order, the appellants filed a time-barred appeal in the Court of Deputy Settlement Commissioner which was dismissed on 23- 5-1967 but then a Revision filed by them was accepted by the Settlement Commissioner by order dated 1-6-1968. Copies of none of these orders have been brought on the record. In any case, the order of the Settlement Commissioner was challenged by separate Writ petitions by the private respondents which were allowed by the impugned judgment of the High Court.
5. The High Court held that the Mukhbari application was consigned to the record and as such whatever proceedings that commenced on that application thereon stood terminated and the subsequent proceedings were entirely different in nature. It was also held that the Settlement Commissioner did not consider the point of limitation as far as the appeal filed by the appellant was concerned. In the circumstances of the case High Court was of the view that it was not, necessary that the appellants should have been issued formal notices before the allotment of the land to the private respondents. According to the High Court, allotments had been made in favour of the private respondents validly and as such the allotments could not be disturbed for the purpose of allotting the lands to the appellants as informers.
6. The finding of the High Court that the Mukhbari application had been consigned to record and action had been taken on another application on behalf of the heirs of the deceased Muhammad Ali cannot be challenged in the absence of relevant record. In these circumstances the entire basis of the claim on behalf of the appellants is gone.
7. Even from whatever record that is available before us, there appear serious doubts whether the application attributed to the informers was in fact moved by the informers. Muhammad Anwar moved the application claiming to be the attorney of the informers. Then the second application is also moved by Anwer on behalf of his father and uncle claiming to be the heirs of Muhammad Ali (husband of Mst. Fazal Bibi). Copy of this application is also not available on record. Was that application in fact moved by the informers? It seems that the so-called informers did not appear at any stage in the inquiry or before any Settlement Authority. As there was a serious doubt about the bona fides of the application alleged to have- been moved on behalf of the informers, it was in any case to be resolved in favour of the respondents who are regular allottees of the land against their balance claim.
8. These appeals are accordingly dismissed for non-completion of record and also on merits.
There will be no order as to costs.