2007 (12) TMI 447

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....the permission granted by the present appellants, the value of the Trees has to be paid by the government. 4. The case of the plaintiff, as culled out from the averments in the plaint is that they are the owners of the suit schedule property. The plaintiffs and their predecessor had drown silver wood, jungle wood and other varieties of trees in the schedule land by spending lot of money and had cultivated the said land with coffee crop. In order to regulate the shade in the schedule property and also for cutting and felling of silver wood, jungle wood and other trees, the plaintiffs had applied for permission for cutting and felling of the silver wood, jungle wood and other trees. Before granting the felling permission of the said trees, a....

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....he High Court where it was held that in respect of reserved trees, the ownership was not with the Government but was with the owner of the land. Accordingly, as noted above, the appeal was allowed. 6. In support of the appeal, learned counsel for the appellant-State submitted that the grant of permission was governed by the Karnataka Preservation of Trees Act, 1976 (in short  the Act'). Permission is required for felling of all trees irrespective of whether they are situated in private or in government land. The permission undisputedly is subject to the stipulated conditions. There is a provision for preferring an appeal in case of refusal to grant permission. The permission was granted on 30.3.1999 and there was a specific condit....

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....rt, in the impugned judgment, referred to some judgments rendered in writ petitions. 9. Reliance on the decision without looking into the factual background of the case before it is clearly impermissible. A decision is a precedent on its own facts. Each case presents its own features. It is not everything said by a Judge while giving a judgment that constitutes a precedent. The only thing in a Judge s decision binding a party is the principle upon which the case is decided and for this reason it is important to analyse a decision and isolate from it the ratio decidendi. According to the well-settled theory of precedents, every decision contains three basic postulates   (i) findings of material facts, direct and inferential. An in....

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....its in with the fact situation of the decision on which reliance is placed. Observations of Courts are neither to be read as Euclid s theorems nor as provisions of the statute and that too taken out of their context. These observations must be read in the context in which they appear to have been stated. Judgments of Courts are not to be construed as statutes. To interpret words, phrases and provisions of a statute, it may become necessary for judges to embark into lengthy discussions but the discussion is meant to explain and not to define. Judges interpret statutes, they do not interpret judgments. They interpret words of statutes; their words are not to be interpreted as statutes. In London Graving Dock Co. Ltd. V. Horton (1951 AC 737 at....