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Civil Petition for Special Leave to Appeal No. 893 of 1980, decided on 17^th March, 1983.

(Against the judgment of the Lahore High Court, dated 22‑4‑1980, passed in Writ Petition No. 231‑R/80).

Arts. 185(3) & 199‑.Dismissal of writ petition. on ground of inordinate delay‑Leave to appeal granted to consider contention that petitioner bad been throughout pursuing his remedy in various forums and as such there was no inordinate delay in filing writ petition in High Court as assumed by that Court:

Ch. Muhammad Abdullah, Advocate Supreme Court with Syed Wajid Hussain, Advocate‑on‑Record for Petitioners.

Mushtaq Ahmad, Advocate Supreme Court with Mehdi Khan Mehtab, Advocate‑on‑Record for Respondents.

Date of hearing : 17th March, 1982.

.‑The petitioners seeks Leave to Appeal against the judgment of the High Court dated 22‑4‑1980, whereby their writ petition, in a settlement matter, was dismissed.

The petitioners are refugees from Village Pindi, Panjoran in Jammu & Kashmir. They were allotted. about 50 Kanals, of land but it was subsequently cancelled by the Additional Rehabilitation Commissioner and re‑allotted to respondents Nos. 1 to 10 on 21‑3‑1960. The petitioners flied an appeal before the Deputy Rehabilitation Commissioner (L), Sialkot, but it was dismissed on the ground that the land had been cancelled by a higher officer. The petitioners, therefore, filed a revision petition before the Additional Commissioner, which was dismissed on 27‑3‑1961. He then filed a review petition before the Rehabilitation Commissioner on 27‑4‑1962, which was misplaced in the office and got lost. The petitioner ran from court to court for getting his petition traced out and ultimately having failed in his efforts they were constrained to file a writ petition in the High Court in 196,4. It was kept pending in the High Court for 15 long years and ultimately came up for hearing on 23‑9‑1979, but the petitioners' counsel did not appear as he omitted to note down the case from the Cause List. The petition was, therefore, dismissed for non‑prosecution. They, however, came to know through some actions taken by the respondents that their writ petition had been dismissed. They, therefore, filed another Writ Petition (No. 231‑R/80) challenging the cancellation of their allotment and its re‑allotment to the respondents. This writ petition was dismissed by a learned Single Judge of the High Court in limine vide the impugned judgment dated 22‑3‑1980 on the ground of laches, observing that they had filed the writ petition against the orders dated 8‑6‑1980 and 6‑11‑1961 after a lapse of about 19/20 years. The learned counsel for the petitioners argued that on the facts as stated by him it is apparent that the petitioners had been through out pursuing their remedy in various forums, and that the main delay occurred in the finalization the earlier writ petition in the High Court. And as such there was n such inordinate delay in filing the writ petition in the High Court, as has been assumed by the learned Judge in Chamber.

3. After hearing the learned counsel we feel that this is a fit case for grant of Leave to consider the above‑noted contentions. Leave is accordingly granted.

Security in the sum of Rs.2,500.

M. Z. M.

Leave granted.

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