Mamlatdar — Authority, Powers (Sections 27–34)

Under the Goa, Daman and Diu Mundkars (Protection from Eviction) Act, 1975, the entire adjudicatory machinery for Mundkar disputes is vested not in the ordinary civil courts but in a revenue officer, the Mamlatdar. Sections 27 to 34, read with the procedural backbone in Chapter III (Sections 20 to 26), define the source, the reach and the limits of that authority - clothing the Mamlatdar with the powers of a civil court, fixing limitation and court fees, mandating the register of mundkars, and crucially ousting the jurisdiction of civil and criminal courts over questions the Act reserves to him. For judiciary and CLAT-PG aspirants, this cluster is where substantive Mundkar rights become enforceable reality.

The scheme: a revenue forum, not a civil court

The Act deliberately removes Mundkar tenure disputes from the regular civil court and reposes them in the Mamlatdar, with a tiered hierarchy above him - appeal to the Collector or the Administrative Tribunal under Section 24, and revision to the Administrative Tribunal or the Government under Section 25. Sections 27 to 34 must therefore be read against Chapter III ("Power, functions, appeals, etc. and maintenance of registers"), which opens at Section 20 with the rule that all inquiries and original proceedings before the Mamlatdar are commenced by an application stating the parties, the dwelling house, the cause of action and the list of documents and witnesses. Section 21 makes the procedure such as may be prescribed, requires every order to record reasons, and - importantly - deems all proceedings before the Mamlatdar to be judicial proceedings within Sections 193, 219 and 228 of the Indian Penal Code. This judicialisation is what justifies the wide adjudicatory powers conferred by Section 27. For the substantive rights these powers protect, see rights of the mundkar and the foundational Goa Mundkars Act hub.

Section 27: powers of a civil court in inquiries and proceedings

Section 27 is the source of the Mamlatdar's adjudicatory muscle. It provides that the Mamlatdar, the Collector, the Administrative Tribunal or the Government "shall exercise in all inquiries, proceedings, appeals or revisions, the powers as are exercised by the concerned trial court, appellate court or a court exercising revisional jurisdiction, under the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908." The effect is that the Mamlatdar, though a revenue officer, wields the CPC powers of a trial court - summoning and examining witnesses on oath, compelling production of documents, issuing commissions, receiving evidence and recording findings. The provision is forum-tiered: the Collector and Tribunal sitting in appeal exercise appellate-court powers, and the Tribunal or Government in revision exercise revisional powers. This deliberate borrowing of CPC powers explains why proceedings are treated as judicial under Section 21(3), and why an order of the Mamlatdar carries the finality and enforceability of a decree. The grant of civil-court powers is, however, confined to the conduct of inquiries; it does not enlarge the subject-matter jurisdiction, which remains tied to the questions the Act assigns to the Mamlatdar.

Section 28: limitation and court fees

Section 28 governs timing and stamping. Sub-section (1) requires that every appeal or application for revision be filed within sixty days from the date of communication of the order of the Mamlatdar, the Collector or the Administrative Tribunal, as the case may be, and expressly attracts Sections 4, 5, 12 and 14 of the Limitation Act, 1963 to such filings. The incorporation of Section 5 means delay in an appeal or revision is condonable on sufficient cause, while Section 12 excludes the time taken for obtaining a copy of the order. Sub-section (2), opening with a non obstante clause over the Court Fees Act, 1870, requires that every application, appeal or revision made under the Act to the Mamlatdar, the Collector, the Administrative Tribunal or the Government bear a court-fee stamp of the value prescribed under the Rules. The sixty-day period mirrors the appeal window in the register provisions of Section 29(8), giving the Act a coherent limitation architecture across both original registration and contested adjudication.

Section 29: preparation and maintenance of the register of mundkars

Section 29 casts on the Mamlatdar one of his most significant administrative-cum-quasi-judicial duties - the preparation and maintenance, for every village, of a register of mundkars recording the dwelling house and its location, the names of the bhatkar and the mundkar, the nature of service or ground rent, the mundkar's occupation, and the rights under Section 6. Sub-section (3) makes the Mamlatdar the authority to prepare and maintain the register after the prescribed inquiry. The procedure is detailed: the Mamlatdar publishes a notice in every revenue village inviting applications (sub-section 4); a talathi may also propose entry of a mundkar who has failed to apply; on receipt of an application the Mamlatdar issues notice to the bhatkar and interested persons calling for objections (sub-section 5); after hearing those who appear he either registers the mundkar or rejects the application (sub-section 6); and the order is served and published on the village notice board (sub-section 7). A person aggrieved by registration or refusal may appeal to the Collector within sixty days under sub-section (8). The registration inquiry is a contested adjudication on the very status of mundkar, dovetailing with the recognition of mundkar procedure and the core definitions.

Register entry versus declaration of status

The relationship between the Section 29 register and a substantive declaration of Mundkar status was examined by the Bombay High Court (Panaji Bench) in Smt. Gulabi Sangtu Devidas v. Smt. Prema Govinda Gauncar (Letters Patent Appeal, decided 31 August 1993). The applicant had applied under Section 29 to have his name entered in the register; after rejection the question arose whether a fresh proceeding for declaration of status was barred. The Court drew a careful distinction between an inquiry confined to whether an entry should be made in the register under Section 29 and an adjudication declaring a person to be a mundkar in his dwelling house. The case illustrates that the Mamlatdar's register function under Section 29, though contested and appealable, is not in every respect coextensive with a declaration of substantive tenure - a distinction examinees must keep clear, because rejection of a register entry does not automatically extinguish the underlying claim to be a mundkar. The decision also confirms the appeal-to-Collector and revision-to-Tribunal route that channels register disputes through the same hierarchy as other Mundkar matters.

Section 30: presumptive value of the register

Section 30 gives evidentiary weight to the work done under Section 29. It provides that an entry made in the register of mundkars, prepared in accordance with the Act and the Rules, "shall be presumed to be true until the contrary is proved or a new entry is lawfully substituted thereafter." This is a rebuttable statutory presumption: the register entry shifts the evidential burden onto the party who disputes it, but it is not conclusive proof of mundkarship. The presumption operates only for entries duly made under the Act, which underscores why the Section 29 inquiry - notice, objections, hearing - must be scrupulously followed. For the substance of what the entry secures, namely the security of residence the Act confers, see rights of the mundkar. The combined effect of Sections 29 and 30 is to create an authoritative, presumptively-true record of tenure that the Mamlatdar both compiles and, in later proceedings, relies upon.

Section 31: protection of officers and bar of civil and criminal court jurisdiction

Section 31 is the keystone of the Mamlatdar's exclusive authority. Sub-section (1) protects any officer from suit, prosecution or other legal proceeding for anything done in good faith under the Act. Sub-section (2) contains the ouster clause: "No Civil Court shall have jurisdiction to settle, decide or deal with any question or to determine any matter which is by or under this Act required to be settled, decided or dealt with or to be determined, by the Mamlatdar or the Collector or the Government or the Administrative Tribunal," and further declares that no order passed by such authority under the Act shall be questioned in any civil or criminal court. The bar is question-specific, not blanket: a civil court is ousted only as to matters the Act reserves to the Mamlatdar - chiefly the existence of mundkar status and the consequential reliefs. This is why eviction of a recognised mundkar can only proceed on the restricted statutory grounds before the Mamlatdar and not by an ordinary civil suit.

Section 32: reference of mundkar issues by a civil court

Section 32 is the practical corollary of the Section 31 bar. Where a suit already instituted in a civil court involves an issue that the Act requires the Mamlatdar or the Collector to settle, the civil court must stay the suit and refer that issue to the Mamlatdar or Collector for determination (sub-section 1). On receiving the reference the Mamlatdar or Collector decides the issue under the Act and communicates the decision to the civil court, which then decides the suit accordingly (sub-section 2). The scope of this mechanism was settled in Suresh Shirodkar v. Administrative Tribunal, Goa, Daman and Diu, (1998) 3 BomCR 261 (Bombay High Court, Goa Bench, N.J. Pandya, J.). The Court held that a decision of the Mamlatdar rendered on a Section 32 reference is itself an "original order" appealable under Section 24 to the Collector or the Administrative Tribunal; the phrase "every original order" in Section 24 is wide enough to embrace orders arising from a reference. The corollary - of direct exam relevance - is that the civil court is bound by the Mamlatdar's decision under the Act's own hierarchy of appeal and revision, and the matter cannot be re-agitated as an ordinary issue in the suit.

Section 33: bar on appearance by pleaders

Section 33 reflects the Act's protective, inexpensive design. Notwithstanding any law in force, no pleader is entitled to appear on behalf of any party in proceedings before the Mamlatdar or the Collector. Three provisos temper the rule: first, the Mamlatdar or Collector may, in the interest of justice and for reasons recorded in writing, allow a party to be represented at its own cost by a pleader; second, the pleader's fees cannot be allowed as part of costs; and third, a government officer who is a court-appointed or statutorily authorised guardian, administrator or manager of a person under legal disability may appear through an authorised representative. The Explanation defines "pleader" to include an advocate, attorney, vakil or any legal practitioner. The object is to keep the Mamlatdar's forum accessible and informal for largely poor mundkars, consistent with the simplified, application-based procedure of Section 20 and the welfare purpose surveyed in the introduction to the Act.

Section 34: penalty and the criminal dimension

Section 34 backs the Mamlatdar's orders and the Act's prohibitions with criminal sanction. Sub-section (1) provides that whoever contravenes any provision of the Act or any rule made thereunder shall, on conviction by a first class judicial magistrate, be punishable with imprisonment up to three months, or fine up to one thousand rupees, or both. Sub-section (2), opening with a non obstante clause over the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, makes every offence under the Act cognizable and compoundable with the permission of the court. Two features deserve note. First, the penalty is tried by a judicial magistrate, not the Mamlatdar - the Act separates adjudication of tenure (Mamlatdar) from punishment of contravention (criminal court), which is consistent with Section 31(2) barring the questioning of Mamlatdar orders in criminal courts rather than barring all criminal jurisdiction. Second, an unlawful eviction of a mundkar - bypassing the restricted grounds - can attract this penalty in addition to the Mamlatdar's power to restore possession under Section 22.

Enforcement: execution and finality of the Mamlatdar's orders

The authority conferred by Sections 27 to 34 would be hollow without enforcement, supplied by Section 22 in Chapter III. Any sum directed to be paid by the Mamlatdar, including costs, is recoverable as arrears of land revenue (sub-section 1). An order of the Mamlatdar evicting a mundkar, or restoring possession or use of a dwelling house, customary easement, electricity or water, is executed in the prescribed manner and "by using such force as may be necessary" (sub-section 2), and his order in execution is, subject to appeal or revision, final (sub-section 3). Section 23 lets the Collector transfer proceedings between Mamlatdars, and Section 26 defines the appellate and revisional powers to confirm, modify or rescind. Read together, Sections 22 to 34 make the Mamlatdar a self-contained adjudicatory and executing authority: he decides status, compiles the presumptive register, enjoys CPC powers, and sees his orders enforced as revenue recoveries or by physical restoration - all insulated from collateral civil-court attack by Section 31. For how this machinery interacts with the landlord's countervailing claim, see bona fide need of the bhatkar.