HYDERABAD, March 13: The Sindh High Court has dismissed a revision application filed by a religious organization — Tehrik- i-Jadid Anjuman Ahmedia Pakistan — seeking possession of 193 acres of land.

Possession of the land was resumed by the government of Pakistan in 1972 under Martial Law Regulation 115.

Justice Mohammad Sadiq Leghari of the Hyderabad bench of the SHC, while handing out the judgment, also imposed a cost upon the petitioner and held the civil court’s judgment to be in flagrant disregard of law.

The suit was filed by the religious organization through its president Mubarik Ahmed Tahir Ahmedi after an appellate court had set aside the judgment of the second senior civil judge, Umerkot, who had decreed the case in favour of the organization.

The counsel for the petitioner had argued before the high court that his client should be declared the exclusive owner of the land because certain paragraphs of the MLR 115 had been declared to be repugnant to Islam by the superior court and they ceased to have effect from March 23, 1990.

According to the petitioner, possession of the land was resumed by the government as a result of land reforms under the MLR 115 in 1972, adding that the same land had been leased out to the petitioner Anjuman, which had been regularly paying the lease money to the Sindh Land Commission at the rate of Rs500 per acre.

The rate was enhanced to Rs1000 per acre from September 1998. Later, the petitioner had filed a suit in the court of the second senior civil judge, Umerkot.

The petitioner had argued that resumption of land possession had become null in the eyes of law following a superior court’s judgment and consequently the SLC and the province of Sindh were liable to refund Rs2,712,545 recovered as lease money after March 23, 1990.

The suit was decreed by the court on the basis of the evidence, produced by the petitioner, in the absence of a written statement by the government of Sindh.

Following an appeal, the appellate court had set aside the civil court’s verdict and remanded the suit to it with directives to permit respondents to file written statements.

The petitioner had in turn filed a civil revision application before the high court.

The state counsel contended that after resumption of land possession, the petitioner had gotten it on lease and had been paying lease money for decades and their claim over the disputed land was malafide and illegal.

The court observed that the resumption of land possession was final and a closed transaction for all purposes, adding that the land had become government property under the MLR 115 and the Anjuman had no title over it.