Amrinder Singh v. The District Collector, Fatehabad And Others

Kamana, vide order dated 26.03.2013 (Annexure P-1).

dated 26.03.2013 (Annexure P-1) 14.10.2014 (Annexure P-2).

2.4 Still aggrieved, respondent No.5 (Annexure P-3); thereby appointing respondent No.5 (Jagpal Singh) as Lambardar of Village Kamana.

9.1 A Division bench of this Court in "Harjit Singh v. State of Punjab", 2023(4) RCR (Civil) 408; held that persons having criminal antecedents cannot be permitted to be appointed as a Lambardar. The relevant extract thereof reads as under: -

5. The appellant has also placed on record the criminal proceedings as such in which the respondent Sahib Singh was involved, which would go on to show that he was involved in a sessions case and was tried by the Additional Sessions Judge, Kangra at Dharamshala under Sections 402, 399, 395 read with Section 34 IPC in an incident which had taken place on 11.03.1999. The allegations were that four persons had got down in front of the Commission Agent who was carrying the amount of commission from different shopkeepers and were armed with sharp edged weapons and they hijacked his vehicle alongwith cash which he had kept in his car and he had thus been robbed of Rs.9,50,000/-.

It is another matter as such that eventually, the case ended in acquittal on the ground that the recovery of the currency notes could not be linked with the commission of the crime. It is also to be noticed that out of the accused persons, three of them were residents of villages falling under Police Station Sujanpur, Pathankot, Punjab including Sahib Singh. The recovery was also effected of Rs.4,73,941/- and though as noticed above, the acquittal is on technical grounds as such.

on 11.03.1999 was also subsequently found abandoned without number plates in the fields. It was held by the trial Court that on account of the fact that the identification in Court by the complainant was after more than 1 year of the occurence and since the accused were not known to him and it was only for a short time they had interacted and he had himself stated that he had not seen the faces of the unidentified persons, the Court had given benefit as such. The allegations were grossly serious and in such circumstances, merely because the District Collector did not specifically refer to them but had gone through the list of cases and kept the principle in mind as laid down by this Court, we are of the considered opinion that persons having criminal antecedents cannot be permitted to be appointed as a Lambardar..."

14.10.2014 (Annexure P-2)

Resultantly, the instant writ petition fails and the same is accordingly dismissed.

14.

All pending application(s), if any, shall also stand closed.