Supreme Court: Article 226 Writ Petition Cannot Be Treated As Article 227 To Deny Right Of Appeal
The Supreme Court has held that a writ petition invoking Article 226 of the Constitution cannot subsequently be treated as a proceeding exclusively under Article 227 merely to deprive an aggrieved party of its valuable right to an intra-court appeal. The judgment was delivered by a Bench of Justice Sanjay Kumar and Justice Sanjeev Sachdeva in Vrindavan Chaturvedi v. Pushpa Devi Khemka, decided on September 2, 2026.
The dispute arose from proceedings concerning orders passed by Revenue Courts. The appellant had challenged a Madhya Pradesh High Court Division Bench order which had declined to entertain his writ appeal on the reasoning that although the original petition had been filed under Article 226, it ought to have been treated as a petition under Article 227. Consequently, the High Court considered the writ appeal unavailable.
The Supreme Court rejected that approach and restored Writ Appeal No. 576 of 2023 before the Madhya Pradesh High Court for fresh consideration on merits. The Court made it clear that the constitutional jurisdiction exercised by a High Court must be determined from the pleadings, nature of the challenge and relief sought, rather than by subsequently re-characterising the proceedings in a manner that eliminates an available appellate remedy.
At the centre of the ruling is the important distinction between Articles 226 and 227. Article 226 empowers High Courts to issue writs, including writs in the nature of certiorari, for enforcement of fundamental rights and for other purposes. Article 227, on the other hand, confers supervisory jurisdiction over courts and tribunals within the High Court’s territorial jurisdiction.
The distinction has direct consequences for appellate rights. An intra-court appeal may ordinarily be available against an order passed in exercise of Article 226 jurisdiction, depending upon the applicable Letters Patent or statutory framework. Proceedings exclusively under Article 227, however, generally do not carry the same intra-court appellate remedy. The Supreme Court has previously recognised this distinction.
The Bench emphasised that Revenue Courts exercising statutory quasi-judicial functions cannot simply be equated with ordinary judicial courts. Orders of such authorities can, in appropriate circumstances, be subjected to scrutiny under Article 226. The constitutional writ jurisdiction of the High Court cannot be artificially narrowed merely because the impugned order originates from a statutory authority or tribunal.
The Court also referred to the principle that the extraordinary jurisdiction of High Courts under Article 226 cannot be scuttled or whittled down by legislation. Where the nature of the proceedings legitimately attracts Article 226, the jurisdiction cannot be converted into Article 227 solely for the purpose of preventing an appeal.
The judgment is particularly significant because it protects the distinction between the substance of a proceeding and the label subsequently attached to it. A petition may contain references to both Articles 226 and 227, and the fact that a High Court exercises some supervisory powers while deciding the matter does not automatically transform the entire proceeding into one under Article 227.
The Supreme Court’s reasoning is consistent with its earlier jurisprudence on composite petitions. In previous decisions, the Court has held that where the facts justify recourse to either Article 226 or Article 227 and the litigant invokes both jurisdictions, courts should, in fairness, avoid depriving that litigant of a valuable right of appeal where the substantial relief is founded on Article 226 jurisdiction.
The Court has also previously explained that the determination cannot depend merely upon the heading of a petition. The pleadings, the nature and character of the order passed by the Single Judge, the directions issued and the jurisdiction actually exercised are relevant in determining whether the resulting judgment falls within Article 226, Article 227, or both.
In the present case, the Supreme Court found that the Madhya Pradesh High Court had wrongly denied the appellate remedy by treating the proceedings as falling exclusively under Article 227. The impugned order dated July 20, 2023 was therefore set aside and the writ appeal was restored for adjudication in accordance with law.
The ruling carries particular importance for litigants challenging orders of Revenue Courts and other statutory quasi-judicial authorities. It reinforces that such proceedings cannot automatically be placed within the restrictive framework of Article 227 when the nature of the challenge legitimately invokes the High Court’s writ jurisdiction under Article 226.
The judgment also serves as a reminder that access to an appellate remedy cannot be defeated through an artificial classification of proceedings. Where constitutional writ jurisdiction under Article 226 has genuinely been invoked and exercised, the resulting judgment cannot simply be re-labelled as an Article 227 order merely because doing so would prevent an intra-court appeal.
The Supreme Court has consequently restored the matter to the Madhya Pradesh High Court, leaving all substantive issues open for determination. The immediate consequence is that the appellant’s writ appeal must now be considered afresh on its own merits and in accordance with law.
The broader legal significance of the ruling lies in its reaffirmation that Articles 226 and 227 are constitutionally distinct jurisdictions and that the difference between them cannot be ignored when determining a litigant’s right of appeal. The decision strengthens the principle that procedural classification should not be used as a device to take away a substantive appellate remedy otherwise available to an aggrieved party.
