The facts giving rise to the instant civil revision are that Property bearing No.437/B was transferred by the Settlement and Rehabilitation Department in open auction held on 25-9-1968 in favour of the respondent, Abdul Aziz Qureshi. Pursuant to the transfer aforementioned made by the said Department, a P.T.D. Was issued in favour of the transferee i.e. Abdul Aziz Qureshi on 30-3-1970. The transferee of the property aforementioned submitted a building plan for additions/alterations in the property transferred to him by the Settlement and Rehabilitation Department. The petitioner/Cantonment Board vide its Resolution No.36, dated 23-5-1985 rejected the application of the respondent-Abdul Aziz Qureshi for the sanctioning of a building plan for addition/alteration in the property transferred to him by the Settlement Department as aforesaid. Feeling himself aggrieved of the rejection of his application by the Cantonment Board vide the resolution aforementioned, the respondent-Abdul Aziz Qureshi preferred an appeal before the D.M.L.C (Director Military Lands and Cantonments), the highest authority controlling the administration of the Cantonment Boards in the country. The Director, Military Landi after thorough examination of the record appended by the respondent--Abdul Aziz Qureshi with his appeal passed an order to the following effect:-- "Mr. Abdul Aziz Qureshi has provided all the documents verifying the transfer of Property No.437/B, Tench Bhatta, Rawalpindi, through P.T.D. By the Settlement Department, as required by the Cantonment Board. It appears that he has transferred the property by the Settlement Department against his claims. The list of the properties acquired by the Cantonment Board also does not appear containing the number of this property in it.
(2)Please give due consideration to his claims and settle the matter as required under the rules."
The order of the Director, Military Lands and Cantonments on the appeal of the respondent-Abdul Aziz Qureshi which has been reproduced hereinabove, notwithstanding the Cantonment Board continued to resist the claim of the respondent-Abdul Aziz Qureshi to have a building plan sanctioned for effecting additions/alterations in Property No.437/B transferred to him by the Settlement and Rehabilitation Department. Confronted with this persistent and blatant stand of the petitioner/Cantonment Board, the respondent-Abdul Aziz Qureshi was constrained to approach the Civil Court through a Civil Suit to seek redress of his grievance against the Cantonment Board so as to have a direction issued to the Cantonment Board to do what it had hithered to refuse to do in spite of the consistent and persistent demands of Mr. Qureshi and the orders of D.M.L.C. The civil suit was instituted on 23-1-1986. The Cantonment Board, petitioner, herein, resisted the respondent's suit by filing a written statement on 5-2-1986. Divergent pleadings of the parries were reflected in the following issues:-- (1)Whether the plaintiff is owner in possession of the disputed land and this land is not part of that property which has been acquired by the Cantonment Board? O. P. P.
(2)Whether the property in dispute has been acquired by the Cantonment Board and as such the plaintiff has no right whatsoever on this property? O.P.D.
(3)If issue No. l is proved and issue No.2 is disproved in favour of the plaintiff then whether the defendant has any justification to reject the site plan? O.P.D.
(4)Whether the suit is not maintainable in its present form? O.P.D. . ,, (5)Relief.
2. After recording the evidence of the parties on the said issues, the learned trial Court decreed the suit of the respondent-Abdul Aziz Qureshi against the petitioner/Cantonment Board vide its judgment and decree, dated 7-1-1992. Feeling itself aggrieved of the judgment and decree of the learned trial Court the petitioners/Cantonment Board preferred an appeal there against before the learned District Judge which came to -be laid before and decided by Khaw4ja Imtiaz Ahmad, learned Additional District Judge, Rawalpindi vide his judgment and decree, dated 6-6-1997. The petitioner has in this background of facts approached this Court in its revisional jurisdiction vested in it under section 115, C.P.C. To interfere with the decrees passed by the two Courts below.
3.Sardar Muhammad Ghazi, Advocate, appearing in support of the civil revision has raised the following contentions:-- (i)that there was no Property bearing No.437/B as was claimed by the respondent-Abdul Aziz Qureshi to have been transferred to him by the Settlement and Rehabilitation Department through a Permanent Transfer Deed and that in actual fact the property being branded by the respondent as Property No.437/B was the property which was bearing Property No.437 which had been duly acquired by the petitioner/Cantonment Board and as a result of the said acquisition had come to vest in the Cantonment Board. This being so, there was no question of the Cantonment Board acceding to the request of the respondent-Abdul Aziz Qureshi of sanctioning his building plan for addition/alteration in a property which was non-existent; (ii)that what was transferred to the respondent-Abdul Aziz Qureshi was a house which according to him was bearing No.437/B. However, he had instituted a suit for permanent/mandatory injunction against the petitioner/Cantonment Board claiming himself to be the owner of land measuring one Kanal and 3 Marlas on account of the transfer in his favour by the Settlement and Rehabilitation Department. Learned counsel for the Cantonment Board submitted that the respondent on his own showing had negated his own suit in that what was allegedly transferred to him was a house through a P.T.D. And in the suit he was claiming himself to be the transferee of the land measuring one Kanal and 3 Marlas. Learned counsel for the Cantonment Board in this view of the contention raised by him maintained that the stand taken by the respondent-Abdul Aziz Qureshi was self-destructive.
4. The civil revision coining before my learned brother Raja Muhammad Khurshid, J, was admitted by him to regular hearing vide his order, dated 3-7-1997.
5. 1 have heard Sardar Muhammad Ghazi, Advocate, on behalf of the petitioner/Cantonment Board and Mr. Habib-ul-Wahab-ul-Khairi, learned counsel for the respondent-Abdul Aziz Qureshi.
6.An examination of the points formulated by Sardar Muhammad Ghazi, Advocate, appearing on behalf of the petitioner/Cantonment Board which formulations of his have been reproduced hereinabove would show that the same are covered by the first three issues framed in the suit.
These issues were factual in nature and their determination covered all the formulations laid by Sardar Muhammad Ghazi, Advocate, appearing on behalf of the petitioner/Cantonment Board.
These factual issues were concurrently found by both the Courts below against the petitioner/Cantonment Board. The findings recorded by the Courts below on these three issues, being findings of fact and being concurrent are A immune from interference by this Court in its revisional jurisdiction. Property No.437/B was transferred by the Settlement and Rehabilitation Department to the respondent-Abdul Aziz Qureshi under the Displaced Persons Compensation and Rehabilitation Act, 1958 and a P.T.D. Was issued pursuant to the said transfer in favour of the respondent. The said P.T.D./transfer not having been questioned by the petitioner/Cantonment Board or anyone else in the world in the hierarchy of Courts under the Settlement laws became final and could not be 8 called in question in any collateral ,proceedings by any one. The petitioner/ Cantonment Board was, thus, trying to throw a challenge to the transfer made in favour of the respondent by the Settlement Department but the same for the aforestated reason could not be done and the transfer in favour of the respondent-Abdul Aziz Qureshi could not be brought under challenge. Apart from this legal infirmity staring the petitioner/Cantonment Board in its face, the C stand taken by the petitioner/Cantonment Board and the role played by it in this whole process is most deplorable. It was the case of the Cantonment Board that Property No.437/B as was claimed to have been transferred by the respondent to him was non-existent and in fact the property being claimed by the respondent as such was bearing No.437 and had been acquired by the Cantonment Board and on account of which acquisition it had come to visit in it. The stand of the Cantonment Board to this effect notwithstanding, no document worth the name was placed on the record by the petitioner/Cantonment Board to substantiate its claim of having acquired the Property No.437. When the respondent failed to persuade the petitioner/Cantonment Board to sanction his building plan for effecting additions/alterations in the property transferred to him by the Settlement and Rehabilitation Department and when his application made for the purpose was rejected by the Cantonment Board vide Resolution No.36, dated 23-5-1985, the respondent approached the highest authority in the hierarchy of the set up of the Cantonment Board in the country i.e. D.M.L.C. (Director Military Lands and Cantonments) in appeal to seek redress of his grievance. The order passed by the Director Military Lands and Cantonments on the appeal filed by the respondent-Abdul Aziz Qureshi has been reproduced hereinabove in extenso and is enough to belie the stand of the Cantonment Board that the Property bearing No.437/B which the respondent claimed to have been transferred to him was non-existent. The Director Military Lands and Cantonments after examining the entire record/documents appended by the respondent-Abdul Aziz Qureshi with his appeal before him felt satisfied that the transfer claimed by the respondent to have been made in his favour by the Settlement Department was genuine and upon his satisfaction as to this he directed the Cantonment Board to give due consideration to the claim of the respondent and to settle the matter as required under the rules. The order of D.M.L.C. The highest authority of the Cantonment Board notwithstanding, the petitioner/Cantonment Board has managed to disobey the same till this day by not sanctioning the building plan submitted by the respondent-Abdul Aziz Qureshi to the Cantonment Board. I can hardly imagine of any other classic example of highhandedness of a Department of the Government viz-a-viz a private citizen. Long ago, a belief was carried that the Government is the noblest of all litigants. I am afraid the conduct of the petitioner/Cantonment Board which is a Department of the Central Government is quite opposite to this ages old belief. The sad story of the respondent's tail of woe perhaps does not and here. There is much to be said and lament about it. As has been argued by the learned counsel for the petitioner/Cantonment Board that the Property No.437/B as was claimed by the respondent to have been transferred to him was non--existent and instead the property which the respondent claimed to be his as bearing No.437/B was in actual fact Property which was bearing No.437 and which was acquired by the Cantonment Board. In order to prove this fact the petitioner/Cantonment Board put in the witness-box its Land Superintendent, Abdul Wakeel, who appeared for the Cantonment Board as D.W.2. Appearing as such he denied the existence of the Property bearing No.437/B as was claimed by the respondent. I am simply amazed at the audacity of this witness, Abdul Wakeel, D,W.2 for making the statement which was false to his knowledge.
While deposing as a witness in the witness-box and crying hoarse that Property No.437/B was non- existent, right at that moment he was carrying his hands a file which when asked by the Court to be opened and shown to the Court turned out to be a file relating to Property No.437-B with the name of the owner Abdul Aziz Qureshi shown thereon. From this fact alone it can be judged how hollow was the stand of the Cantonment sBoard as to its assertion that Property No.437/B was non- existent and how untruthful was the witness, this Lands Superintendent Abdul Wakeel who was assigned the task of proving this false stand of the Cantonment Board. There is yet another aspect of exposing the Cr.c falsity of the stand of the petitioner/Cantonment Board viz-a-viz the respondent as to the Property in dispute i.e. 437/B. When the petitioner/Cantonment Board did not see the reason and refused to pass the building plan submitted by the respondent to it, the respondent requested the petitioner/Cantonment Board to have the property physically inspected.
Accordingly it was so inspected by the two members of the Cantonment Board i.e. Muhammad Aslam Mughal and Ch. Khan Muhammad besides Raja Muhammad Ashraf an Engineer of the Cantonment Board. The report submitted by the two members and the Engineer to the Cantonment Board is available on the record vide the documents exhibited as Exh.P.9. The report submitted by the two members and the Engineer is to the following effect:-- "We have inspected the site, there is no objection to the proposed construction. "
7.. The case of the petitioner/Cantonment Board as hereinabove indicated all along was that the Property No.437/B was non-existent and the property which was described by the respondent as Property No.437/B was in fact Property No.437 and that the same had been acquitted by it and vested in it. The respondent put in the witness-box Muhammad Zaman as P.W.S. This witness has exploded the myth of the petitioner's stand altogether by deposing that the Properties Nos.437 and 438 not only belonged to him but that he was in possession of the said properties. How on earth in the face of this evidence could the petitioner/Cantonment Board claim that 437 was the property which vested in it and which it had acquired.
8.In the face of these findings which as aforesaid are factual in nature besides being concurrent, no interference whatever is called for to be made by this Court in the exercise of its revisional jurisdiction in the judgments and D decrees of the Courts below. In this view of the matter, which I take I am fortified by the law laid down in judgments reported as Nazir Ahmad and others v. Boota and others 1989 SCMR page 450, Riaz v. Muhammad Salim and 4 others 1989 SCMR 1491, Faiz Ahmad v. Mst. Allah Wasai 1988 SCMR 234, Muhammad Rafiq v. Divisional Engineer, P.W. Railway and others 1992 CLC 786, Muhammad Siddique v. Inayat Khan 1992 CLC 1748 and Nazar-ur-- Rehman's v. Noroz Khan 1990 CLC 1186.
9. The civil revision filed by the petitioner/Cantonment Board viewed in this perspective is wholly without merit and merits outright dismissal and is dismissed accordingly with no order as to costs.