The Supreme Court has ruled that entries in revenue records may constitute relevant evidence of possession but cannot, by themselves, establish ownership over immovable property or prove that land was irrevocably dedicated to a religious institution.
The Bench of Justice Prashant Kumar Mishra and Justice Shree Chandrashekhar also reiterated that long and uninterrupted possession does not automatically mature into adverse possession. A party relying on adverse possession must specifically plead and prove when its possession became hostile to the true owner.
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The Court delivered the ruling in Bhag Singh (Dead) Through Mahant Kashmir Singh v. Basant Kaur (Dead) Through Legal Representatives and Others, while dismissing an appeal arising from a decades-old dispute over the title and possession of agricultural land measuring 4 Kanals and 18 Marlas in Muktsar, Punjab.
The dispute involved competing claims based on a registered sale deed executed on May 13, 1965, and an alleged earlier dedication of the property to Dera Bhai Mastan Singh for “Dharam-Arth”, or religious and charitable purposes.
The plaintiffs had instituted a civil suit in 1981, seeking a declaration that they were owners in possession of the land and a permanent injunction restraining the defendants from interfering with their possession. Their claim was based on the registered sale deed executed by Gajjan Singh and Baggu Singh in favour of their predecessor.
According to the plaintiffs, possession of the property was delivered when the sale deed was executed. However, the revenue records continued to show Attar Singh Chela Bhai Gulab Singh in the possession column, even though he had died nearly 20 years before the suit was filed.
The representatives of Dera Bhai Mastan Singh contested the suit. They claimed that the property had ceased to be the private property of its original owners long before the 1965 sale deed because it had been irrevocably dedicated to the Dera for religious and charitable purposes.
They relied principally on revenue records that described Attar Singh’s possession as “gair marusi bila lagan bawaja Dharam Arth”, indicating possession without payment of rent for religious purposes. They argued that Attar Singh held the property as Mahant of the Dera and that successive Mahants continued to possess and cultivate it after his death.
The defendants further argued that the Dera had remained in continuous, open and uninterrupted possession for several decades and had consequently acquired ownership through adverse possession.
They also questioned the scope of the 1965 sale deed. According to them, Gajjan Singh and Baggu Singh jointly owned only one-half of the property, while the remaining half belonged to Pritam Singh. The vendors, therefore, could not have transferred title over the entire land.
The Trial Court dismissed the suit on January 22, 1983. It relied heavily on the Jamabandi for 1945-46 and subsequent revenue records to conclude that the property had been dedicated to the Dera and that possession continued through its successive Mahants.
The Trial Court also found that the plaintiffs had not proved that possession was actually delivered under the 1965 sale deed. No mutation or subsequent revenue entry recorded a change of possession in their favour. It also drew an adverse inference from the plaintiffs’ failure to examine Baggu Singh, one of the executants of the sale deed.
The First Appellate Court affirmed the dismissal of the suit on January 25, 1985. It held that the description “gair marusi bila lagan bawaja Dharam Arth” demonstrated that the property had been dedicated for religious purposes. It further concluded that a separate registered instrument was not necessary once possession had been delivered to the Dera.
The Punjab and Haryana High Court, however, reversed the concurrent decisions in a second appeal on March 22, 2011. It held that the defendants had failed to prove either a completed dedication or the essential ingredients of adverse possession. The High Court consequently decreed the suit in favour of the plaintiffs.
Before the Supreme Court, the Dera’s representatives argued that the High Court had exceeded its jurisdiction under Section 100 of the Code of Civil Procedure by disturbing concurrent factual findings recorded by the two lower courts.
The Supreme Court rejected the contention and upheld the High Court’s interference.
Drawing a distinction between possession and ownership, the Bench observed that Jamabandis, Khasra Girdawaris and other revenue records are maintained primarily for fiscal purposes. While they are admissible as evidence concerning the nature and continuity of possession, they do not create or extinguish title.
“The question of ownership must ultimately be determined on the basis of substantive evidence establishing the source of title,” the Court said.
The Bench held that the Trial Court and the First Appellate Court had treated the revenue entry describing possession for Dharam-Arth purposes as sufficient proof of a completed dedication. That approach was legally unsustainable.
The Court clarified that a formal deed may not be indispensable in every case for dedicating property to a religious or charitable institution. A dedication may be established through unequivocal conduct where the law recognises it. However, the burden remains on the person asserting the dedication to prove that the owner had clearly and permanently divested himself of ownership and vested the property in the religious institution.
Mere long possession by a Mahant or an entry recording cultivation for religious purposes could not conclusively prove an irrevocable transfer of ownership, the Court held.
The Supreme Court also noticed an internal inconsistency in the defendants’ case. They claimed title both through a completed religious dedication and through adverse possession.
The Bench explained that these two doctrines rest on fundamentally different legal foundations. If ownership had already vested in the Dera through a valid dedication, there would ordinarily be no occasion for it to acquire the same property through adverse possession. Adverse possession necessarily assumes that the title originally belonged to another person and was later extinguished because of hostile possession for the statutory period.
The lower courts had accepted both claims simultaneously without reconciling their conflicting legal foundations, the Supreme Court observed.
Addressing the adverse possession claim independently, the Bench said that such possession must be actual, open, continuous and hostile to the title of the true owner. Mere uninterrupted occupation, regardless of its duration, is insufficient unless accompanied by a clear intention to hold the property in denial of the true owner’s rights.
In the present case, the defendants themselves claimed that Attar Singh entered into possession as Mahant for Dharam-Arth purposes under an earlier dedication. Thus, the origin of his possession was not pleaded as being hostile to the recorded owners.
“Possession founded upon such an assertion cannot, without more, simultaneously be characterised as hostile possession so as to attract the doctrine of adverse possession,” the Court observed.
The Bench further found that neither the pleadings nor the evidence identified the date on which the Dera’s possession allegedly became hostile. There was also no evidence of an overt act through which the title of the recorded owners was repudiated to their knowledge.
The absence of such foundational pleadings was not a mere technical defect, the Court said. Unless the commencement of hostile possession is pleaded and proved, the limitation period necessary for acquiring title by adverse possession cannot begin to run.
“The doctrine of adverse possession does not reward longevity of occupation alone. It protects only such possession as is accompanied by a conscious and hostile assertion of ownership in denial of the rights of the true owner,” the Bench held.
The entry “gair marusi bila lagan bawaja Dharam Arth” could indicate that possession was connected with religious or charitable purposes. However, it neither recorded an assertion of hostile ownership nor demonstrated the extinguishment of the recorded proprietors’ title.
The Court accordingly agreed with the High Court that the revenue records did not establish acquisition of ownership by the Dera.
On the plaintiffs’ sale deed, the Supreme Court accepted the legal principle that a person cannot transfer a better title than the one he possesses. Therefore, if Gajjan Singh and Baggu Singh owned only one-half of the property, the sale deed could not convey an interest greater than their lawful share.
However, the Court clarified that possible imperfections in the plaintiffs’ title could not establish ownership in favour of the defendants. Each party claiming ownership must succeed on the strength of its own title and not merely on the weakness of the opposing party’s case.
The defendants continued to bear the burden of proving either a valid dedication or acquisition of ownership by adverse possession. Since they failed to establish either claim, they could not defeat the plaintiffs merely by questioning the extent of interest conveyed under the sale deed.
The Supreme Court also held that the High Court had acted within the limits of its second appellate jurisdiction. The High Court had not interfered simply because a different factual view was possible. It had corrected the lower courts’ erroneous application of the legal principles governing religious dedication, revenue records and adverse possession.
Concurrent factual findings do not enjoy immunity under Section 100 of the CPC when they are based on a misapplication of law, unsupported by evidence, reached by ignoring material evidence or founded on an incorrect understanding of settled legal principles, the Bench reiterated.
The Court ultimately held that the representatives of the Dera failed to prove that the property had irrevocably vested in Dera Bhai Mastan Singh through a completed dedication or that the Dera had subsequently perfected its title through adverse possession.
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