3 Answers
Dear Client,
To begin with, you hold the superior right to the property. Under property law, the principle of prior registered title applies, which means that since your sale deed was registered first for the specific dimensions, your claim to the full fifty feet length takes precedence. The subsequent buyer purchased whatever area was left, meaning any physical shortage of land legally affects their share, not yours. The neighbor has no legal right to poach upon your boundary to compensate for the overall land shortage or to extend their pathway.
Secondly, to resolve this without a lengthy court battle, your first step should be to formalize the physical boundaries. You should apply to the local Taluk, Tahsildar, or municipal office for an official government survey and demarcation of your property based on your prior registered sale deed. Once the government surveyor officially marks your fifty-foot boundary and provides a survey report, you have the authoritative backing to immediately erect a fence or construct a boundary wall to secure your property line.
If the neighbor obstructs the fencing process or refuses to remove the pathway after the official survey, you can file a formal police complaint for criminal trespass and illegal encroachment. While police usually avoid purely civil property disputes, a government survey report clearly showing your ownership often compels them to intervene and stop the trespassing.
Lastly, you can have an advocate send a strong legal notice demanding the immediate removal of the encroaching pathway. A formal legal notice based on a government survey report often serves as an effective warning and can force the neighbor to back down and settle the matter without you ever having to actually file a civil lawsuit.
I hope this answer helps, if you have any other query kindly do not hesitate to contact us. Thank-you.
Dear Client,
Your registered title carries priority, and the described boundaries, not merely the stated measurements, are what determine your rightful extent. It is a settled principle in Indian conveyancing that where a discrepancy exists between the mentioned area and the boundaries described in a deed, boundaries generally prevail, since measurement errors are common but boundary descriptions reflect the parties' actual intent. Since your document was registered first, the seller could only convey the remaining land to the back tenant thereafter, so any genuine 1-foot shortfall in the parent property should logically be absorbed from his portion, not yours, following the principle that the earlier registered transferee's rights take priority over a later one from the same source.
To deal with this problem without having recourse to any civil action, firstly, have a certified demarcation report from the Survey/Revenue Department showing the boundary stones based on the records. Send out a notice from a lawyer to the tenant with the report demanding that the encroachment path be removed within a certain period of time.
I hope this answer helps. If you have any further query kindly do not hesitate to contact us. Thank you.
Dear Client,
I understand your legal query, and you are seeking a remedy for your situation. Having had a closer look at your issue, I suggest that you first obtain a government land survey report of your land that properly shows the designated land as well as the measurements.
Secondly, you may file a complaint before the Revenue Officer along with the registered deed and the survey report, claiming that the said part of the land belongs to you and that the boundary extending to the backside of your plot is being illegally encroached upon by the tenant on the backside.
You can also approach the local panchayats, who can help you in settling the matter through mediation and also presenting the land survey map. You can explain to the neighbor that the first registration rule applies and the person who sold them the land should be blamed.
Lastly, in case you get no solution from other means, you can then provide a legal notice to the tenants to clear the pathway where they have encroached the land within 15 days of the time period; otherwise, legal consequences follow.
Hope this helps!
For further legal assistance, you can surely contact us
OLQ LAW FIRM