2025:JHHC:26242 1 IN THE HIGH COURT OF JHARKHAND AT RANCHI Civil Review No. 31 of 2018 ---------- 1. Ashish Tirkey, son of late Fanuel Tirkey, resident of Kotta, P.O. Saparom, P.S. Nagri, District Ranchi. 2. Gaurav Kumar Sharma, son of late Sanatan Sharma, resident of Rana Toli, Rana Chowk, P.O. Lohardaga, P.S. Lohardaga, District Lohardaga. 3. Raghwendra Kumar, son of late Bhuneshwar Prasad Singh, resident of Balok Colony, P.O. Lohardaga, P.S. Lohardaga, District Lohardaga. ………. Petitioners Versus 1. The State of Jharkhand. 2. Department of Personnel and Administrative Reforms, Government of Jharkhand, through its Principal Secretary, Project Bhawan, P.O./P.S. Dhurwa, District Ranchi. 3. Deputy Commissioner, Lohardaga P.O. Lohardaga, P.S. Lohardaga, District Lohardaga. 4. Circle Officer, Kisko, Lohardaga, P.O. Kisko, P.S. Kisko, District Lohardaga. 5. Block Development Officer, Kisko Block, P.O. Kisko, P.S. Kisko, District Lohardaga. 6. Block Development Officer, Lohardaga Block, P.O. Lohardaga, P.S. Lohardaga, District Lohardaga. ………. Respondents. ---------- CORAM: HON’BLE MR. JUSTICE DEEPAK ROSHAN ----------- For the Petitioners : Ms. Rakhi Rani, Advocate For the Respondents : Mr. Rahul Saboo, GP-II Mr. Kunal Chandra Suman, AC to GP-II ---------- 07/ 29.08.2025 Heard learned counsel for the parties. 2. Learned counsel for the petitioners assails the impugned order by saying that there is error apparent on the record. 3. However, while submitting she only argues about the findings given by the learned Writ Court. She further referred the judgment passed in Moran Mar Basselios Catholicos v. Mar Poulose Athanasius1, wherein at para 47 it has been held as under: 1 (1954) 2 SCC 42 2025:JHHC:26242 2 “47. We do not consider that the contention of the learned Attorney General is entirely well-founded. Issue 20(1) contains several charges against the plaintiffs and even if Charges (a) and (b) have been referred to in the majority judgment, Charges (c), (d) and (e) have certainly not been dealt with. As to the temporal power of the Patriarch the District Judge held in para 58 of his judgment that the Patriarch had no temporal authority or jurisdiction or control over the Malankara Jacobite Syrian Church and its temporalities and that the power of general supervision over spiritual Government conceded to the Patriarch in Ext. DY did not carry with it by necessary implication the right to interfere in the administration of the temporalities and properties of the Church. The decision to the contrary in 41 TLR 1 cannot be regarded as having any bearing after that judgment was set aside subject only to three points as hereinbefore mentioned. It does not appear that the majority Judges considered whether the plaintiffs imputed full temporal powers to the Patriarch or the limited one as conceded to him in Ext. DY and if they did impute to him full temporal powers whether they had departed from a fundamental tenet of the Church. They do not also appear to have considered whether, if the plaintiffs originally pledged themselves to the tenet of full temporal power of the Patriarch and thereby departed from the fundamental article and such departure involved their having become aliens, any subsequent change in their attitude by limiting it as in Ext. DY would make a difference. Further, as to the power of consecrating Metropolitans Nokes, J. found that a validly appointed Catholicos had the power, under both versions of the Canon, to consecrate Metropolitans without a Synod and that by so claiming the defendants had not become aliens to the faith. The learned Judge, however, did not consider the implication of this finding so far as the plaintiffs were concerned. This finding may lead to the implication that the claim that the Patriarch alone has got the power of ordination and the Catholicos has not that power cannot but be regarded as a departure from the Canon. Issue 20(l)(a)(i) which relates to the consecration of Morone has been found in favour of the defendants. If the defendants have not gone out of the Church by making the claim that Morone may be consecrated by the Catholicos or the Metropolitan in Malankara then the learned Judge should have considered whether a denial of such right by the plaintiffs constituted a departure by them from the canonical law. This the learned Judge failed to do. Issue 20(1)(a)(iii) related to the establishment of the Catholicate. In “pleading” 124 the plaintiffs maintained that a Catholicate had not been established at all. The District Judge held that Abdul Messiah by his Kalpana Ext. 80 revived the Jacobite Catholicate. The respondents' ground of Appeal No. 17 assumed that a Catholicate had been established. Nokes, J., held that Abdul Messiah was a Patriarch, that a Patriarch had the power by himself and without the Synod to establish a Catholicate and that a Catholicate had been established by him although the old Catholicate of the East had not been revived. Sathyanesan, J., however, held that the establishment of the Catholicate in Malankara was dubious, surreptitious and uncanonical and that no Catholicate had been established. The two judgments appear to be somewhat at variance in this respect. In any case, Nokes, J. has not considered whether the stand taken by the plaintiffs that no Catholicate had been established at all amounts to 2025:JHHC:26242 3 a departure by them from the injunctions of the Canon law. On a fair reading of the majority judgments it appears to us that the majority Judges have been misled by a misconception as to the nature and scope of the concession alleged to have been made by the defendants' advocate. If the acts imputed to the defendants amounted to a voluntary separation, the learned Judges should have considered whether the acts imputed to the plaintiffs likewise amounted to a voluntary separation. If the defendants had not gone out of the Church by asserting that a Catholicate had been established, that the Catholicos can ordain Metropolitans and consecrate Morone then they should have considered whether by denying these assertions the plaintiffs had not gone out of the Church. This they failed to do. They could not properly decline to go into the question of fact on account of the admission of the defendants' advocate that the plaintiffs remained in the Church. Such admission at best was an admission as to the Canon law and the decision that the defendants had voluntarily gone out of the Church even in the absence of an ecclesiastical verdict necessarily implies that the concession made by the defendants' advocate requiring an ecclesiastical verdict as a condition precedent to voluntary separation also was obviously wrong and an erroneous concession of law made by the defendants' advocate could not be relied upon for saving the plaintiffs. The fact, therefore, that Cross- objection 11 filed in the High Court by the defendants does not appear to have been pressed makes no difference. In our opinion, for reasons stated above, this head of objection raised by the learned advocate for the appellants before us is well-founded and the judgments of the majority Judges are vitiated by an error of a kind which is sufficient reason within the meaning of the Code of Civil Procedure for allowing the review.” 4. Learned counsel for the respondents opposes the review application. 5. Having regard to the aforesaid facts and circumstances of the case, admittedly, there is no error apparent on face of record and it is settled law that the Review Court never sits in an appeal of its own order. On the one hand, the judgment cited by learned counsel is on different facts and on the other hand, recently, the Hon’ble Apex Court in the case of Sanjay Kumar Agarwal v. State Tax Officer2 has given guidelines for the review. For brevity, the same is extracted herein below: “16. The gist of the aforestated decisions is that: 16.1. A judgment is open to review inter alia if there is a mistake or an error apparent on the face of the record. 16.2. A judgment pronounced by the court is final, and departure from that principle is justified only when circumstances of a substantial and compelling character make it necessary to do so. 16.3. An error which is not self-evident and has to be detected by a process of reasoning, can hardly be said to be an error apparent on the face of record justifying the court to exercise its power of review. 2 (2024) 2 SCC 362 2025:JHHC:26242 4 16.4. In exercise of the jurisdiction under Order 47 Rule 1CPC, it is not permissible for an erroneous decision to be “reheard and corrected”. 16.5. A review petition has a limited purpose and cannot be allowed to be “an appeal in disguise”. 16.6. Under the guise of review, the petitioner cannot be permitted to reagitate and reargue the questions which have already been addressed and decided. 16.7. An error on the face of record must be such an error which, mere looking at the record should strike and it should not require any long-drawn process of reasoning on the points where there may conceivably be two opinions. 16.8. Even the change in law or subsequent decision/judgment of a coordinate or larger Bench by itself cannot be regarded as a ground for review.” 6. Accordingly, the instant review application stands dismissed. (Deepak Roshan, J.) kunal/-