Punjab Village Common Lands (Regulation) Act, 1961

No: 18 Dated: May, 04 1961

The Punjab Village Common Lands (Regulation) Act, 1961

Punjab Act No. 18 of 1961

    An act to consolidate and amend the law regulating the rights in shamilat deh and abadi deh.

    Be it enacted by the State of Punjab in the twelfth year of the Republic of India as follows:

1. Short title, extent and commencement. - (1) This Act may be called the Punjab Village Common Lands (Regulation) Act, 1961.

(2) It extends to the whole of the State of Punjab.

(3) It shall come into force at once.

2. Definitions. - In this Act, unless the context otherwise requires, -

(a) "Collector" means the Collector of the District in which the village is situated, or any other officer, not below the rank of an Executive Collector of the First Grade appointed by Government to perform the duties of a Collector under this Act;

(b) "displaced person" means a person defined as such in the East Punjab Displaced Persons (Land Resettlement) Act, 1949, or the Patiala and East Punjab States Union Displaced Persons (Land Resettlement) Ordinance, 2006 Bk.;

(c) "house" includes a courtyard whether walled or not.

(d) "inhabitant of a village" means, a person whether a proprietor or a non-proprietor, who ordinarily resides in the village :

Provided that temporary absence or absence in relation to employment elsewhere shall not affect his residence in the village;

(e) "Panchayat" means a panchayat constituted or continued under the Punjab Gram Panchayat Act, 1952, or the Pepsu Panchayat Raj Act, 2008 Bk, and includes a municipal committee of a municipality of the third class declared as such by section 10 of the Pepsu Municipal (Amendment) Act, 1956;

(f) "prescribed" means prescribed by rules made under this Act;

(g) "shamlat deh" includes -

(1) lands described in the revenue records as shamlat deh excluding abadi deh;

(2) shamlat tikkas;

(3) lands described in the revenue records as shamlat, tarafs, pattis, pannas and tholas and used according to revenue records for the benefit of the village community or a part thereof or for common purposes of the village;

(4) lands used or reserved for the benefit of village community including streets, lanes, playgrounds, schools, drinking wells, or ponds within abadi deh or gorah deh; and

(5) lands in any village described as banjar qadim and used for common purposes of the village according to revenue records :

Provided that shamlat deh at least to the extent of twenty-five per centum of the total area of the village does not exist in the village;

but does not include land which -

(i) becomes or has become shamlat deh due to river action or has been reserved as shamlat in villages subject to river action except shamlat deh entered as pasture, pond or playground in the revenue records;

(ii) has been allotted on quasi-permanent basis to a displaced person;

(iii) has been partitioned and brought under cultivation by individual landholders before the 26th January, 1950;

(iv) having been acquired before the 26th January, 1950, by a person by purchase or in exchange for proprietary land from a co-sharer in the shamlat deh is so recorded in the jamabandi or is supported by a valid deed;

(v) is described in the revenue records as shamlat taraf, pattis, pannas and thola and not used according to revenue records for the benefit of the village community or a part thereof or for common purposes

(vi) lies outside the abadi deh and is used as gitwar, bara, manure pit or house or for cottage industry;

(vii) is shamlat deh of villages included in the fourteen revenue estates called 'Bhojes" of Naraingarh Tehsil of Ambala District;

(viii) was shamlat deh, was assessed to land revenue and has been in the individual cultivating possession of co-sharers not being in excess of their respective shares in such shamlat deh on or before the 26th January, 1950; or

(ix) is used as a place of worship or for purposes subservient thereto;

(h) "shamlat law" means -

(i) in relation to land situate in the territory which immediately before the 1st November, 1956, was comprised in the State of Punjab, the Punjab Village Common Lands (Regulation) Act, 1953; or

(ii) in relation to land situated in the territory which immediately before the 1st November, 1956, was comprised in the State of Patiala and East Punjab States Union, the Pepsu Village Common Lands Regulation) Act, 1954;

(i) "State Government" means the Government of the State of Punjab.