Family land clubbing under ceiling law prevails, with only expressly provided separate treatment for an adult son.

Under the Himachal Pradesh Ceiling on Land Holdings Act, 1972, family land had to be clubbed for permissible area computation where the statute treated husband, wife and minor children as one unit and also required land held by family members to be aggregated. An adult son was separately deemed a unit only to the extent expressly provided by the Act, and a wife could not claim complete independence from the family for ceiling purposes merely because land stood in her name. The Supreme Court rejected reliance on stare decisis because the statutory language was clear and inconsistent earlier views could not override it.

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Issues: Whether, under the Himachal Pradesh Ceiling on Land Holdings Act, 1972, the land held by a landowner's wife and sons was to be clubbed together for determining the permissible area, and whether an adult son or wife could claim a separate permissible unit independently.

Analysis: Section 4 treated a family consisting of husband, wife and up to three minor children as one unit for the purpose of permissible area, while Section 4(4) specifically created an exception for every adult son by deeming him a separate unit subject to the overall ceiling. Section 4(6) further required that where a person was a member of the family, the land held by that person together with the land held by all family members had to be counted for calculating permissible area. Reading the scheme as a whole, the Court held that the provision was clear and did not permit an adult son or wife to be treated as wholly independent of the family for ceiling computation merely because they held land separately. The plea based on stare decisis was rejected because the statutory language was found to be unambiguous and the earlier view was inconsistent with the text of the Act.

Conclusion: The family holdings were required to be clubbed for ceiling purposes in accordance with Section 4, subject only to the statutory treatment of an adult son as a separate unit; the High Court's contrary view was incorrect.

Final Conclusion: The appeal succeeded, the High Court's judgment was set aside, and the revenue authorities' approach to computing permissible area under the ceiling statute was restored.

Ratio Decidendi: Where the ceiling statute expressly treats a family as a unit and also mandates clubbing of the land held by family members, individual holdings cannot be excluded from computation except to the extent specifically provided by the statute.

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