Jharkhand HC: Jamabandi Running Since 1965 Cannot Be Cancelled Without Civil Court Decree

A Division Bench of the Jharkhand High Court dismissed a Letters Patent Appeal challenging rent receipts issued in favour of a rival claimant, holding that revenue authorities lack jurisdiction to cancel a long-running Jamabandi under the Bihar Tenants’ Holdings (Maintenance of Records) Act, 1973, and that only a competent civil court can grant such relief.

The High Court of Jharkhand at Ranchi, in a judgment pronounced on 14 July 2026, dismissed a Letters Patent Appeal filed by eight appellants who had challenged the issuance of rent receipts over 24.79 acres of land at Village Kabilasi, Circle Daru, District Hazaribagh, in favour of the estate of the late Vishwanath Baidh. The Division Bench, led by Chief Justice M.S. Sonak and authored by Justice Rajesh Shankar, affirmed the Single Judge’s order of 22 December 2025 dismissing the underlying writ petition. The Bench held that since a Jamabandi had been opened in the name of the original respondent as far back as 1965, revenue authorities were duty-bound to issue rent receipts and had no power under the Act of 1973 to cancel that entry. A rival claim of the kind pressed by the appellants can only be agitated before a civil court.

The Land Dispute and Administrative Proceedings

The dispute concerns land under Khata No. 36, Plot No. 1355 (19.60 acres) and Plot Nos. 839 and 842 (5.19 acres) — a total of 24.79 acres — situated at Village Kabilasi, Police Station and Circle Daru, District Hazaribagh. The appellants claimed that this land was settled in favour of their ancestors long ago, that they and their predecessors had been in peaceful possession since then, and that mutation and rent receipts had earlier been issued in their names.

In August 2015, the original respondent No. 5, Vishwanath Baidh, applied to the Circle Officer, Daru (respondent No. 4) and the Deputy Commissioner, Hazaribagh (respondent No. 3) seeking acceptance of rent and issuance of rent receipts in his name. Both authorities did not act on those applications. He then approached the Member, Board of Revenue, Jharkhand, Ranchi, who issued Letter No. 1314 dated 9 October 2015 directing the Deputy Commissioner to have rent receipts issued in Vishwanath Baidh’s favour. The Deputy Commissioner followed with Memo No. 2582 dated 16 October 2015, directing the Circle Officer to issue the receipts within three days. The Circle Officer then initiated Misc. Case No. 2 of 2015-16 and directed the Halka Karamchari accordingly.

The appellants contended that the order of 16 October 2015 was passed without serving them any notice, in violation of principles of natural justice. They and other villagers filed a joint representation dated 6 January 2016 to the Principal Secretary, Department of Revenue, Registration and Land Reforms, which was forwarded to the Board of Revenue. In response, the Member, Board of Revenue, vide Letter No. 9(M) dated 7 January 2016, directed the Deputy Commissioner to get all facts verified by a senior, impartial officer before acting on the earlier Letter No. 1314, and to cancel the Jamabandi if found incorrectly created.

Following this direction, the Circle Officer prepared a verification report vide Letter No. 155 dated 22 April 2016 and sent it to the Additional Collector, Hazaribagh. A spot verification team comprising the Additional Collector, the Block Development Officer-cum-Circle Officer, Daru, the Circle Inspector, Halka Karamchari, and the Anchal Amin (In-charge) visited the site in the presence of police force and villagers. The team found that Vishwanath Baidh was in cultivating possession of the 24.79 acres, that the Jamabandi had been opened in his name in 1964-65 itself, and that no new Jamabandi had been created in his favour in 2015. Documents produced by the complainants were found forged and incomplete, and their claims about the presence of Aahar, Graveyard, Chhat Ghat, and Karbla over part of the land were found false.

Rent receipts for the revenue years 1977-78 to 2015-16 were thereafter issued in Vishwanath Baidh’s favour on the basis of the spot verification. The appellants then filed W.P.(C) No. 1615 of 2017 seeking, among other reliefs, quashing of the Jamabandi opened in Vishwanath Baidh’s name, quashing of Memo No. 2582 dated 16 October 2015, quashing of the Circle Officer’s order of 16 October 2015 in Misc. Case No. 02/15-16, and a direction restraining Vishwanath Baidh from interfering with their possession. The Single Judge dismissed that petition on 22 December 2025, and the present Letters Patent Appeal followed.

A Preliminary Complication: Death of Respondent No. 5

Before the appeal could be heard on merits, the appellants pressed Interlocutory Application No. 3692 of 2026 seeking substitution of respondent No. 5, Vishwanath Baidh, who had died on 23 July 2022. The Bench noted that the Single Judge had disposed of W.P.(C) No. 1615 of 2017 on merits on 22 December 2025 without noticing that Vishwanath Baidh had already expired. The Division Bench, by order dated 6 July 2026, allowed the substitution application, bringing his legal representatives on record for both the writ petition and the appeal. Counsel Mr. A.K. Sahani, appearing for the legal representatives, confirmed no objection and waived service.

Why the Jamabandi of 1965 Was the Decisive Fact

The appellants argued that the Member, Board of Revenue had no jurisdiction to direct the opening of Jamabandi in Vishwanath Baidh’s name, that the order of 9 October 2015 was passed without hearing them, and that the entire chain of administrative action flowing from it was consequently void. The Bench found this narrative factually incorrect on the record.

On perusal, the court found that the Jamabandi of the 24.79 acres had been opened in Vishwanath Baidh’s name in 1965 itself, through Misc. Case No. 17 of 1964-65 and Misc. Case No. 18 of 1964-65, entered at Pages 89 and 90 of the old Register-II. Rent receipts in his favour had been issued continuously from 1964-65 to 1976-77. When receipts were not issued after 1977, he pursued the matter administratively for decades and ultimately reached the Member, Board of Revenue in 2015. The Bench held that the Member’s letter of 9 October 2015 did not direct the creation of a new Jamabandi; it directed the issuance of rent receipts against a Jamabandi that had been running in Vishwanath Baidh’s name for fifty years. That direction was unimpeachable in law.

The Bench restated the settled position: once a Jamabandi is opened in favour of a raiyat, revenue authorities are duty-bound to accept rent and issue receipts. “They cannot stop issuing rent receipt without any order of a competent Court of law cancelling the Jamabandi.” In the present case, the appellants produced no such court order cancelling the 1965 Jamabandi.

No Hearing Required Before Issuing Receipts to an Existing Raiyat

The appellants pressed the natural justice argument: they were given no opportunity before the Circle Officer’s order of 16 October 2015. The Bench rejected this. Since the Jamabandi was already running in Vishwanath Baidh’s name, no third party was entitled to a hearing before receipts were issued to him. The court found it significant that the appellants did receive an effective opportunity after the fact — their joint representation of 6 January 2016 triggered a fresh direction from the Member, Board of Revenue, which put further action on hold pending enquiry, and the subsequent spot verification gave them a chance to produce documents. Those documents were found forged and incomplete.

Jurisdiction of Revenue Authorities and the Bihar Tenants’ Holdings Act, 1973

The Bench engaged at length with the Bihar Tenants’ Holdings (Maintenance of Records) Act, 1973, which governs the maintenance of revenue records in Jharkhand. Section by section, the court noted that the Act contains no provision conferring on any State revenue authority the power to cancel a Jamabandi. Applying the principle that a statutory authority can only exercise powers conferred on it by statute, the Bench held that any purported cancellation by a revenue authority would be without jurisdiction and a nullity in law.

The court relied on State of Jharkhand v. Izhar Hussain, 2020 SCC OnLine Jhar 1978, where a Co-ordinate Bench had held that “Jamabandi once created cannot be annulled” by any revenue authority and that a long-running Jamabandi can be cancelled only by filing a suit before the competent court of civil jurisdiction, as affirmed by the Supreme Court in Ramayan Yadav & Ors. v. State of Bihar & Ors., (2013) 3 PLJR 533.

The court also referred to Mahabir Mahto & Others v. The State of Jharkhand & Ors., 2012 SCC OnLine Jhar 1290, which held that a person cannot claim mutation when they have wholly adverse interest to the person whose name is entered in the revenue record. That judgment also settled that in a mutation proceeding, no declaration of right, title or interest can be made, and no order of possession can be passed to evict one party in favour of another, even where the claimant holds a valid transfer document.

The Bench applied both rulings directly. The appellants do not trace their title through Vishwanath Baidh; they assert a claim adverse to him. Revenue authorities therefore had no jurisdiction to adjudicate that rival claim or to cancel the 1965 Jamabandi. The appropriate forum for such a dispute is a civil court.

Outcome

The Division Bench found no infirmity in the Single Judge’s order dated 22 December 2025 dismissing W.P.(C) No. 1615 of 2017. L.P.A. (Filing) No. 3006 of 2026 was dismissed as devoid of merit. All pending interlocutory applications, if any, were disposed of as not surviving. The court clarified that the appellants are at liberty to pursue other remedies as permissible under law.