ORDER
A. Lakshmana Rao. J.
1. Late Kantineni Venkatappa filed a declaration on March 3,1975 under the provisions of the Andhra Pradesh Land Reforms (Ceiling on Agricultural Holdings) Act, 1973 (hereinafter referred to as the Act) on behalf of his family unit consisting of himself and his two major sons. The declaration was referred to the Tahsildar in whose jurisdiction the land was situate, for local inspection and verification. After the verification report was received, an enquiry was held by the Land Reforms Tribunal. The declarant was represented by an advocate. The deposition of the declarant was recorded. On a consideration of the evidence adduced on behalf of the declarant and the relevant material on record, the Land Reforms Tribunal passed an order dated November 24,1976 determining the excess holding of each of the three members of the joint family at 03723 standard holding.
2. Thereafter, the declarant filed a surrender statement on behalf of all the members of the joint family on August 5,1977 giving the particulars of the land he proposed to surrender. The total extent of the land surrendered was Ac.31-45 cents. The surrender statement was accepted and the State Government had taken possession of the surrendered land. Compensation of Rs. 7,500-00 was ordered to be deposited and it was accordingly deposited. The amount was directed to be deposited by an order dated March 22, 1981. Though a notice was issued to late K. Venkatappa and his two sons to receive the amount, it is stated that they did not receive the amount of compensation. While so, the declarant filed an application on July 26, 1984 purporting to be an objection-cum-review petition under Rule 16(5) of the A.P. Land Reforms (Ceiling on Agricultural Holdings) Rules, 1974 (for short the Rules), which reads as follows:
16(5): “The Revenue Divisional Officer, tine District Collector, Tribunal and the Appellate Tribunal shall have the power:-
(a) to make orders incidental or ancillary to the decision of such officer or authority;
(b) to correct any clerical or arithmetical mistakes in judgments or errors arising therein from any accidental slip or omission, either of its own motion or on the application of the parties.”
3. In the application filed by the declarant under Rule 16(5), it was mentioned that the computation of ceiling area and awarding of compensation were not done in accordance with law. It has been stated that dry-cum-wet land has been classified as dry land. Therefore, the declarants requested the Land Reforms Tribunal to review the matter and recompute their holding afresh. The Land Reforms Tribunal reconsidered the matter and redassified the dry-cum-wet land as dry land. Accordingly the Land Reforms Tribunal redetermined the holding of the members of the family. It ordered that the family unit of the declarant acid his two major sons K. Lingappa and K. Ramappa was entitled to hold three standard holdings and that the re-determination of their standard holdings came to 2.0927 which was below the ceiling area. Therefore, it directed the Revenue Divisional Officer, Adoni, to re-deliver possession of the lands which were already surrendered by them. This order was pronounced on July 10, 1986.
4. Aggrieved by the order of the Land Reforms Tribunal, Kurnool, the Special Tahsildar (Land Reforms), Kumool preferred appeal to the Land Reforms Appellate Tribunal, Kumool in L.R.A. No. 13 of 1986. The Land Reforms Appellate Tribunal has held that under Rule 16(5) the Land Reforms Tribunal cannot recompute the holding by re-classifying the lands in the light of the law declared by the later decisions. Questioning the validity of this order, the declarants have filed the present revision petition. When the matter was posted before a learned Judge of this Court, it was referred to a Division Bench by an order dated March 20,1989. After hearing the learned Counsel for the petitioners” and the respondent, the Division Bench was of the opinion mat the matter required to be considered by a Full Bench mainly on the ground that the decision of a Division Bench of this Court in Laxma Reddy and Ors.s v. The State of Andhra Pradesh, was rendered without taking into consideration the effect of Rule 10-A of the Rules. Rule 10-A relates to retransfer of land vested in Government in certain cases. To the extent it is relevant, the rule is extracted hereunder:
Rule 10-A. (1) Where as a result of the fresh determination of excess land or approval of fresh surrender of excess land or selection of the land to be surrendered in accordance with the provisions of the Act as amended by the Andhra pradesh Land Reforms (Ceiling on Agricultural Holdings) Amendment Act, 1977 (Act 10 of 1977), any land vested in the Government Under Section 11 is to be retransferred to the person who surrendered such land, the Tribunal shall pass an order to the effect that the said person is entitled for retransfer of such land and specify the extent of such land and also the amount, if any, to be repaid by him to the Government in respect of that land and communicate the order to the Revenue Divisional Officer.”
It is manifest from this rule that the question of retransfer of land to the declarant will arise only where a fresh determination of excess land had been made either by the Tribunal or the appellate authority.
5. In the present case, the Land Reforms Tribunal, Adoni passed the order dated November 24, 1976 determining the excess holding of the members of the joint family of Late K. Venkatappa. Pursuant to that order, the members of the family surrendered excess land. The order of the Land Reforms Tribunal has thus become final. Long after the land was surrendered, the declarants filed a petition purported to be under Rule 16(5) of the Rules seeking recompilation of the holding after reclassification of the land. In view of the clear and unambiguous language of Rule 16(5), the Tribunal has no power to recompute the holding on the basis of the redassification of the land in the light of the law declared by the later decisions. The averments made in the petition filed by the declarants seeking recomputation of holding on the basis of the reclassification of the land, clearly indicate that the said relief has been sought for in view of the later decisions of the Court. It was, no doubt, mentioned therein that a mistake was committed by the declarants in mentioning the nature of the lands as wet instead of dry and therefore a mistake was committed by the Tribunal in the computation of their holding. A perusal of the order dated November 24, 1976 passed by the land Reforms Tribunal clearly indicates that the Tribunal had determined the holding of the members of the family of late K. Venkatappa on a consideration of the nature of the lands with reference to the relevant factors including the verification report. The classification of the lands had been set out in the order itself. Therefore, the mistake if any alleged to have been committed by the Land Reforms Tribunal in the computation of the holding cannot be said to be either a clerical or an arithmetical mistake nor can it be said to have arisen due to any accidental slip or omission. In this connection, it will be apposite to refer to the following observations made by the Federal Court in Sachindra Nath v. S.M. Pankijini Dassi, 5 DLR (F.C.) 68 in a matter arising Under Section 152, Code of Civil Procedure which is in pari-materia with Rule 16(5):
“It needs to be stressed that the key-Word in the relevant phrase is “accidental” and it qualifies “omission” also, with the result that the procedure provided by the section cannot be used to correct omissions, however, erroneous, which are intentional, not indeed in the sense of conscious choice for no Court is supposed to commit an error knowing it to be such, but in the sense that the Court meant to omit what was omitted.”
6. In a case arising under Rule 83 of the Orissa Sales Tax Rules, 1947, the Supreme Court explained in Master Construction Co. (P) Ltd. v. State of Orissa and Anr., the meaning of the expressions “arithmetical or clerical mistakes” and “an error arising or occurring from accidental slip or omission”. The relevant portion of the judgment is as follows:
“An arithmetical mistake is a mistake of calculation; a clerical mistake is a mistake in writing or typing. An error arising out of or occurring from an accidental slip or omission is an error due to a careless mistake or omission unintentionally made.”
Any re-computation of the holding can be made only after a fresh consideration of the matter on mertis. Such a fresh consideration is permissible only in the exercise of the power of review. But no such power has been conferred on the Land Reforms Tribunal under the provisions of the Act and the Rules made thereunder. Having regard to the facts and circumstances of the case, it cannot be held that any mistake either clerical or artithmetical or an error arising out of an accidental slip or omission, was committed by the Land Reforms Tribunal while determining the holding of the declarants, in its order dated November 24, 1976. That order had become final as the declarants did not choose to question its validity by filing an appeal. Accepting the order, the declarants surrendered the land and die State Government accepted the surrender. In such circumstances, the petition filed by the declarants under Rule 16(5) of the Rules cannot be entertained. The following observations made in this regard by a Division Bench of this Court in Laxman Reddy and Ors. v. The State of Andhra Pradesh (1 supra) are quite relevant:
“It is common knowledge that finality has to be attached to the judicial proceedings at every stage unless the finding is challenged in the appropriate forum. When the holding of the declarant was decided and when the said order was permitted to become final, it is not known as to how the same can be questioned in surrender proceedings and surrender proceedings shall be restricted only to the points that are permitted to be raised in the said proceedings. During the surrender proceedings also if the correctness or otherwise of the fixation of the holding of the declarant was permitted to question, there can never be any end or finality to the proceedings determining the holding of the declarant By no stretch of imagination reclassification of the lands be termed as either clerical or arithmetical mistakes from the meaning of the said words quoted supra……”
7. Therefore, the order passed by the Land Reforms Tribunal recomputing the holding of the declarants is illegal. Therefore, the appellate authority was quite justified in setting aside that order. In view of this conclusion of ours, the question relating to the applicability of Rule 10-A of the Rules in a matter like this does not arise for consideration. Therefore, the C.R.P. fails and it is accordingly dismissed. There shall be no order as to costs.