1 CGHC010243892026 NAFR HIGH COURT OF CHHATTISGARH AT BILASPUR WP227 No. 765 of 2026 Order reserved on 10/07/2026 Order delivered on 28/07/2026 1 - Chimandas Rawlani S/o Parsumal Rawlani Aged About 65 Years R/o Karbala, Chowk Bilaspur District Bilaspur C.G. 2 - Pooja Hariramani W/o Shri Vinod Hariramani Aged About 35 Years R/o Karbal Chowk Bilaspur District Bilaspur C.G. ... Petitioners versus 1 - State Of Chhattisgarh Through The Collector Bilaspur District Bilaspur C.G. 2 - Manish Sahu The Sub Divisional Officer (Revenue) Bilaspur C.G. 3 - Prakash Sahu Tehsildar Bilaspur C.G. 4 - Manish Shukla Revenue Inspector Village Juna Bilaspur C.G. Through Tehsildar Bilaspur C.G. 5 - Parmeshwar Sahu Revenue Inspector, Village Sarkanda Bilaspur C.G. Through Tehsildar, Bilaspur C.G. 6 - Shiv Pratap Sav S/o Late Amar Nath Sav R/o Baniyapara Juna Bilaspur District Bilaspur C.G. ---Respondents (Cause title taken from Case Information System) VED PRAKASH DEWANGAN Digitally signed by VED PRAKASH DEWANGAN Date: 2026.07.28 20:14:50 +0530 2 For Petitioners : Mr. Sunil Kumar Soni, Advocate For Respondent No.1/State : Mr. Avinash Singh, Govt. Advocate Hon'ble Shri R avindra Kumar Agrawal , Judge C.A.V. Order 1. The petitioners have filed the present writ petition under Article 227 of the Constitution of India, challenging the impugned order dated 21.05.2026, passed by the Chhattisgarh Board of Revenue, Bilaspur, in Case No. RN/02/R/Vividh/41/2026, whereby the revenue revision under Section 50 and Section 8 of the Chhattisgarh Land Revenue Code has been rejected. The petitioner prayed for the following reliefs in the present writ petition:- “In view of the above submission, the petitioners pray for the following relief(s) :- 1. Hold that Passing of the Impugned Order Dated 21.05.2026 (ANNEXURE-P/3)by the Board of Revenue is a Patent Violation of Judicial Comity and Judicial Discipline. Judicial Comity requires that a Single Member or a smaller bench must follow the decision of a Larger Bench (Full Bench) of the same court. 2. This Hon'ble Court May Kindly be Pleased to Quash Impugned Order Dated 21.05.2026 (ANNEXURE-P/3) Passed by the Board of Revenue, Bilaspur (C.G) in Revision Case No. RN/02/R/ vividh /41/2026 & Matter may Kindly be Remand Back for Consideration of the Application Under Section 50 of the Land Revenue Code. 3. That the entire record of the case may kindly be called for elucidation of the facts of the case. 3 4. Any other relief , which this Hon'ble Court deems fit and proper in the facts and circumstances of the case.” 2. Learned counsel for the petitioners would submit that on an application being made by the respondent No. 6, the Tahsildar, Bilaspur, passed an order on 16.01.2026 for demarcation of the land of Khasra No. 272/2, area 0.113 hectares, situated at village Juna Bilaspur, Tahsil and District Bilaspur. Against the order dated 16.01.2026, the petitioners approached the Chhattisgarh Board of Revenue by filing a revision under Section 50 and Section 8 of the Chhattisgarh Land Revenue Code, 1959. The board of revenue rejected the revision on the ground that under the Land Revenue Code, the order passed by the Tahsildar for demarcation of the land was to be challenged before the Collector under the Revisional Jurisdiction. He would further submit that the Board of Revenue have completely ignored the order passed by learned Full Bench of the Board of Revenue reported in 1989 Revenue Nirnay 46 (Moharsai vs. State of M.P. and others) in which it has been held that an application for revision under Section 50 of the Land Revenue Code against the order of any subordinate revenue court can be presented directly to the board of revenue without first moving to the Lower Court and such application cannot be rejected on the ground that special cause must be shown for non-applying before the lower Revisional Court. He would further submit that the Board of Revenue has rejected the revision on this very ground that the petitioners have not explained the special cause for directing an approach to the Board of Revenue. He would further submit that some other persons 4 are also approaching the Board of Revenue directly under the revisional jurisdiction which is being entertained by the Board of Revenue. However, the petitioner’s revision has been rejected. He would also submit that the order passed by the learned Full Bench is binding upon the Single Bench of the Board of Revenue, and a sufficient cause cannot be said to exist for directly approaching the Board under the revisional jurisdiction of Section 50 of the Land Revenue Code. It is next submitted that merely mentioning Section 8 of the Land Revenue Code in the application does not render the application invalid. He would further submit that Section 41 of the Code empowers the Board to frame its rules under the Code for regulating the practice and procedure of the Board and other Revenue Officers. Rule 364 has been framed for the Board and Rule 365 has been framed for other Revenue Officers, and there is no restriction on filing the revision directly to the Board. The Board of Revenue has taken a technical view and rejected the revision filed by the petitioners. Therefore, the impugned order may be set aside, and the Board of Revenue may be directed to decide the revision of the petitioner on its own merits. 3. Per contra, learned counsel appearing for the State supported the impugned order passed by the Chhattisgarh Board of Revenue and would submit that no prejudice is being caused to the petitioner by the rejection of his revision application, and he has a right to approach the Collector under the revisional jurisdiction. Therefore, the writ petition does not merit and is liable to be dismissed. 5 4. I have heard learned counsel for the parties and perused the material annexed with the petition. 5. The controversy involved in the present writ petition lies within a narrow compass. The petitioner has challenged the order dated 17.04.2026 passed by the Board of Revenue whereby the revision preferred under Section 50 read with Section 8 of the Chhattisgarh Land Revenue Code, 1959 against the demarcation order passed by the Tahsildar has been held to be not maintainable, and the petitioner has been relegated to avail the remedy before the Collector. A perusal of the impugned order would show that the Board of Revenue has not dismissed the revision on the ground of lack of jurisdiction. On the contrary, in paragraph 4.1 of the impugned order, the Board of Revenue itself has recorded that under Section 50 of the Land Revenue Code it possesses revisional jurisdiction against the order passed by the Tahsildar and that under Section 8 it also exercises supervisory jurisdiction over the subordinate revenue authorities. Thus, the existence of jurisdiction has not been doubted by the Board itself. The sole reason assigned by the Board for declining to entertain the revision is that the petitioner failed to establish any "special circumstance" necessitating the filing of the revision directly before the Board instead of first approaching the Collector. 6. The main submission advanced on behalf of the petitioner is that the Board of Revenue has committed a jurisdictional error in declining to entertain the revision preferred directly under Section 50 of the Chhattisgarh Land Revenue Code, 1959. Reliance has been placed 6 upon the Full Bench decision of the erstwhile Board of Revenue, Madhya Pradesh in Moharsai v. State of M.P., reported in 1989 Revenue Nirnaya 46, wherein it was held that a revision under Section 50 could be presented directly before the Board of Revenue without first invoking the jurisdiction of the lower revisional authority and that such revision could not be rejected merely because the applicant had failed to disclose any special or emergent circumstance. There can be no quarrel with the proposition that the said decision, having interpreted the provisions of Section 50 of the Land Revenue Code, deserves due respect and carries considerable persuasive value. However, being a decision rendered by a Full Bench of the Board of Revenue, it does not constitute a binding precedent upon this Court exercising constitutional jurisdiction under Articles 227 of the Constitution of India. 7. The reasoning adopted in Moharsai (supra) principally proceeds on the premise that, since Section 50 does not expressly prescribe a sequential hierarchy amongst the various revisional authorities, an unrestricted choice of forum is available to every litigant. The said interpretation undoubtedly emanates from a literal reading of Section 50. At the same time, it is equally well settled that statutory provisions cannot be construed in isolation. Every provision of an enactment must receive a harmonious construction so as to advance the legislative intent and to give meaningful effect to every part of the statute. The absence of an express prohibition against directly approaching the Board does not, by itself, conclude the issue if the statutory scheme, read as a whole, indicates a structured distribution of revisional functions amongst different revenue authorities. 7 8. The Chhattisgarh Land Revenue Code creates a complete hierarchy of revenue authorities commencing from the Tahsildar and extending through the Sub-Divisional Officer, Collector, Commissioner and ultimately the Board of Revenue. Simultaneously, Section 50 confers revisional jurisdiction upon more than one authority. Such conferment undoubtedly establishes concurrent competence; however, concurrent competence does not necessarily translate into an unfettered right in every litigant to choose any forum of his preference irrespective of the statutory hierarchy. The revisional jurisdiction vested in the Collector and the Commissioner is also a conscious legislative conferment and cannot ordinarily be treated as superfluous. Whether the Legislature intended that every order passed by the Tahsildar could, at the option of the litigant, be challenged directly before the Board of Revenue, thereby substantially bypassing the statutory role assigned to the intermediate revisional authorities, is an important question touching the interpretation of the Code as an integrated enactment. 9. This Court is, however, of the opinion that it is neither necessary nor appropriate to render a conclusive pronouncement upon the aforesaid larger issue in the present proceedings. The correctness, applicability and extent of the ratio laid down in Moharsai (supra) in the context of the statutory scheme of the Chhattisgarh Land Revenue Code may appropriately fall for consideration in a case where such question directly arises for authoritative determination. It would, therefore, be inappropriate for this Court, while exercising supervisory jurisdiction under Article 227 of the Constitution, either to 8 affirm or to disapprove the entire ratio of the Full Bench decision. Suffice it to observe that the issue is not free from difficulty and deserves consideration in an appropriate proceeding after a comprehensive examination of the legislative scheme. 10. In the present case, the impugned order merely relegates the petitioner to avail the statutory revisional remedy before the Collector, who is admittedly vested with revisional jurisdiction under Section 50 of the Code. The petitioner has thus not been deprived of an efficacious statutory remedy. The supervisory jurisdiction of this Court under Article 227 is essentially discretionary and is intended to ensure that subordinate courts and tribunals act within the bounds of their jurisdiction. Such jurisdiction is ordinarily not exercised to substitute one available statutory forum with another, particularly where the impugned order does not occasion any manifest failure of justice or result in the extinguishment of the petitioner's substantive remedy. The petitioner continues to have an effective statutory forum available for adjudication of his grievance on merits. Even assuming that the revision before the Board was maintainable in view of Moharsai (supra), this Court, in exercise of its discretionary jurisdiction under Article 227, is not inclined to compel the Board to entertain the revision, since the petitioner has an equally efficacious statutory revisional remedy before the Collector and no irreparable prejudice has been demonstrated. 11. With respect to the framing of Rules 364 and 365 by exercising the powers under Section 41 of the Code, this Court further finds that, prior to the deletion of Section 41 of the Chhattisgarh Land Revenue 9 Code by the Amendment Act of 2022, the Board of Revenue was empowered to frame rules regulating its own practice and procedure as well as the procedure of Revenue Officers. In exercise of the said power, two distinct sets of rules were framed under separate notifications, namely Notification No. 364 governing the practice and procedure of the Board of Revenue and Notification No. 365 governing the practice and procedure of Revenue Officers. Rule 1(i) of Notification No. 365 specifically contemplates that applications shall ordinarily be entertained by the lower Court competent to deal with them and, if presented otherwise, they may be returned for presentation before the proper Court. Admittedly, the said rule is applicable to Revenue Officers and not to the Board of Revenue, which is not a 'Revenue Officer' within the meaning of Section 11 of the Code. Equally, the Rules governing the practice and procedure of the Board under Notification No. 364 do not contain any corresponding provision either permitting or prohibiting the direct institution of revision petitions before the Board. The omission of such a provision in the Board's Rules cannot, by itself, be construed as conferring an unrestricted right upon every litigant to bypass the intermediate revisional authority. The Rules framed under Section 41 are essentially procedural in nature and cannot enlarge or curtail the substantive revisional jurisdiction conferred by Section 50 of the Code. Consequently, the question whether a litigant possesses an unfettered right to directly invoke the revisional jurisdiction of the Board has to be answered on a harmonious construction of the provisions of the Code as a whole and not merely on the basis of the absence of a procedural restriction in Notification No. 364. 10 12. In view of the aforesaid discussion, this Court is not inclined to issue a positive direction requiring the Board of Revenue to entertain and decide the petitioner's revision on merits. Issuance of such a direction would necessarily require this Court to conclusively determine the larger question concerning the true ambit of Section 50 and the inter se relationship between the revisional jurisdictions of the Collector and the Board of Revenue, which this Court considers unnecessary for the disposal of the present writ petition. Accordingly, while leaving the larger question of law open for consideration in an appropriate case, this Court declines to interfere with the impugned order. 13. The petitioner shall, however, be at liberty to avail the statutory revisional remedy before the Collector, if so advised. If such revision is preferred within thirty days from today, the same shall be considered on its own merits and in accordance with law, without rejecting it on the ground of limitation for the period during which the petitioner bona fide pursued the proceedings before the Board of Revenue and this Court. 14. Accordingly, the writ petition is dismissed. Sd/- (Ravindra Kumar Agrawal) Judge ved