S/L 07 03.11.2025 Court No.1 (Susanta) CALCUTTA HIGH COURT IN THE CIRCUIT BENCH AT JALPAIGURI CIVIL REVISIONAL JURISDICTION CO 196 of 2025 Smt. Sabita Bhaoyal @ Sabita Bhawal & Ors. Vs. Sri Dhiren Ch. Paul & Ors. Mr. Amalesh Roy, Sr. Adv. (V.C), Mr. Bhaskar Roy Mahashaya, Mr. Nigam Mittal, … for the Petitioners. The certified copy of the order of the learned Trial Court filed by the petitioners, be kept with the record. The pre-emptors in a proceeding under Sections 8 & 9 of the West Bengal Land Reforms Act, 1955 (hereinafter referred to as >the said Act of 1955? in short) are the petitioners of the instant application under Article 227 of the Constitution of India. The petitioners sought to pre-empt the sale effected by the registered deed of sale bearing no.819 dated April 28, 2003 on the ground that they are the raiyats of the plot adjoining to the suit plot. The said application for pre-emption was registered before the 2nd Court of learned Civil Judge (Junior Division), Jalpaiguri as Misc. (Pre-Emption) Case No. 26 of 2003. The learned Trial Judge by the order dated January 09, 2017 had allowed the said Misc. Case, aggrieved thereby the pre-emptees, the opposite party nos. 1 to 3, had preferred an appeal before the learned District Judge, Jalpaiguri being Misc. Appeal No. 13 of 2017. The learned Appeal Court below by the judgment and order dated July 21, 2025 had allowed the said appeal thereby has set aside the order of the learned Trial Judge holding, inter alia, that the pre-emptors since have failed to deposit the entire consideration price along with 10% of it at the time of filing of the 2 application for pre-emption, in view of the decisions of the Hon?ble Supreme Court in the cases of Barasat Eye Hospital & Ors. Vs. Kaustabh Mondal reported in (2019) 19 SCC 767 and Abdul Matin Mallick Vs. Subrata Bhattacharjee (Banerjee) reported in (2022) 7 SCC 147, the said application for pre-emption is not maintainable. Mr. Amalesh Roy, learned Senior advocate for the petitioners submits that there is no dispute with the proposition of law that short deposit at the time of filing the application for pre-emption under Section 8 of the said Act of 1955 is fatal but the said proposition, in the facts and circumstances of the present case, is not applicable inasmuch as the said application for preemption was filed way back on June 16, 2003 and the learned Trial Judge once has allowed the prayer of the petitioners to make good of the said short deposit, in pursuance thereof, the petitioners had deposit the balance of the consideration price along with 10% of it. The pre- emptees had preferred an appeal. The Appeal Court below had remanded the Misc. Case to the learned Trial Judge to decide it on merit without touching the issue of short deposit, therefore, the pre-emptees are not entitled to re-open the said issue. Heard Mr. Roy, perused the materials-on-record. It appears that the Appeal Court below has specifically dealt with the said contention of the pre- emptees and has held as under: - <28. Therefore, law is well settled that if the preemptor did not deposit the entire consideration amount along with 10% of the sale consideration at the very inception of lodging the preemption case, the claim of preemption by the preemptor against the preemptee, which is a weak right, cannot be entertained in view of the specific statutory provision in Section 8 read with section 9 of the said Act. It is not in dispute that in second round of trial where in view of the direction of the Ld. Trial Judge vide order dated 09.01.2017 the preemptor deposited the remaining consideration 3 amount, whereas the original case was instituted long back in the year 2003. Therefore, by operation of law, the instant preemption case is not maintainable.= This Court, particularly, in view of the abovementioned decisions of the Hon?ble Supreme Court, does not find any illegality and/or infirmity with the said findings of the Appeal Court below warranting interference, accordingly, C.O. 196 of 2025 is dismissed without any order as to costs. Parties to act on the server copy of this order duly downloaded from the official website of this Court. Urgent Photostat certified copy of this order, if applied for, be supplied to the parties subject to compliance with all requisite formalities. (Biswajit Basu, J.)