Muzaffarnagar : A Muzaffarnagar court has dismissed a decades-old land claim by the Town Area Committee, now Nagar Panchayat Shahpur, bringing relief to the heirs of a family that has been fighting the legal battle since 1975.
3 Ravi Kumar Diwakar allowed an appeal filed by the heirs of Ilmchand Arya and set aside a lower court judgment delivered on Nov 30, 2017. In its 71-page order dated Oct 22, 2026, the court upheld the validity of a registered sale deed executed in 1963.
The additional district judge and fast track court No, according to lawyer Amit Gupta.
Arya family members who challenged the lower court’s order include Satyaveer Arya (72), Mahaveer Arya (65), Ranveer Singh Arya (63), Devraj Arya (50), Satyawati Arya (65), and Saroj Arya (55). In its judgment, the court held that the UP Zamindari Abolition and Land Reforms Act, 1950, did not apply to the disputed property. It observed that the land had been within the town area’s limits since 1863. The court also upheld the sale deed dated Aug 19, 1963, executed by Mehar Ilahi Khan in favour of Ilmchand Arya and Baljor Singh. Another key observation concerned an Allahabad high court ruling in 1955, which had already dealt with the ownership dispute involving the predecessors of the Arya family. With the appeal allowed, the 2017 judgment has been set aside and the civic body’s original suit dismissed.
It noted that the sellers had ownership rights over the property. The court held that the principle of ‘res judicata’, which prevents the same dispute from being reopened after it has been decided, applied in the case. The judge also observed that the civic body’s suit was barred by limitation and questioned the authority under which it had been filed.