FCC strikes down 1996 Land Commission Order

July 21, 2026 (MLN): The Federal Constitutional Court has ruled that decisions finalized by competent authorities under the Land Reforms Regulation, 1972 cannot be reopened decades later through an administrative order.

In a detailed 25-page judgment authored by Chief Justice Justice Amin-Ud-Din Khan, a two-member bench headed by the Chief Justice accepted the civil appeals and set aside the Federal Land Commission Chairman’s order dated August 22, 1996, along with the Lahore High Court’s judgment and the subsequent mutation.

The court held that the Deputy Land Commissioner and the Land Commissioner had issued their decisions in 1972, and since those rulings were never challenged before any higher legal forum, they had attained finality. As a result, there was no legal basis to reopen or alter them years later.

According to the judgment, the proceedings initiated by the Federal Land Commission in 1977 were confined to determining whether Mst. Hshmat Habib-ur-Rahman possessed additional agricultural land in another district, as reported by APP.

The court observed that those proceedings were not intended to reopen or invalidate the confiscation orders passed in 1972.

The bench noted that the Federal Land Commission Chairman proceeded on the assumption that Mst. Hshmat Habib-ur-Rahman and her husband were separate declarants and issued the 1996 order contrary to the final decisions of 1972.

The judgment stated that this plea had already been rejected by the competent authorities in 1972 and was never challenged through legal proceedings.

The Federal Constitutional Court further ruled that disputes relating to land ownership or benami transactions cannot be decided through administrative proceedings, particularly where the matter has already been conclusively settled under the law.

The judgment also observed that the appellants had been cultivating the disputed land as tenants since 1971.

As recognized tenants under the Land Reforms Regulation, 1972, they had acquired a legal right to have their land allotment considered, and that right could not be taken away through subsequent unlawful administrative action.

Concluding the case, the court held that the Federal Land Commission Chairman had exceeded his legal authority by reopening a matter more than two decades after it had attained finality.

It ruled that the August 22, 1996 order was contrary to the Land Reforms Regulation, 1972 and the legal principle of finality, and therefore could not be sustained.

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