Court No. - 1
Case :- WRIT - C No. - 38671 of 2019 Petitioner :- Sri Sailendra Awasthi And 21 Others Respondent :- State Of U.P. And 2 Others Counsel for Petitioner :- Praveen Kumar,Onkar Nath Vishwakarma Counsel for Respondent :- C.S.C.
Hon'ble Ramesh Sinha,J. Hon'ble Ajit Kumar,J.
Heard Sri Pradeep Kumar, learned Senior Advocate assisted by Sri Praveen Kumar, learned counsel for the petitioners, Sri Rahul Malviya, learned Standing Counsel for the State respondent nos. 1 & 2 and Sri Narendra Kumar Maurya, learned Advocate appearing for respondent no. 3.
By means of this petition under Article 226 of the Constitution, the petitioners have raised their grievance that their long standing constructions have been marked and are liable to be demolished at any point of time and regarding said exercise the district administration has not given any opportunity of hearing to the petitioners.
Entertaining this petition on the above grievance raised by the petitioners, we had in our order dated 26.11.2019 directed learned Standing Counsel to have instructions in the matter and also to apprise the respondent no. 3 about the pendency of present petition.
Today, we find that Sri Narendra Kumar Maurya, learned Advocate has put in appearance on behalf of respondent no. 3 and accordingly he has been heard.
Sri Rahul Malviya, learned Standing Counsel has placed instructions before us which are taken on record. In the instructions we find that the demolition exercise is part of removal of unauthorized encroachment as directed by this Court in Public Interest Litigation No. 255 of 2019 in which in its concluding and operative portion the Division Bench has observed thus:
"We are of the view that the District Magistrate be directed to consider the cause of the petitioners. Accordingly, to meet the ends of justice we issue following directions:
(i) The District Magistrate shall get the area inspected by some responsible official;
(ii) On the basis of the inspection report, the District Magistrate shall hold a meeting of officers of the concerned Department, i.e. Irrigation Department, Public Works Department, Forest Department and Nagar Panchayat and issue necessary directions in accordance with law.
The petitioners are permitted to move a fresh comprehensive representation to the District Magistrate along with a copy of the public interest litigation within two weeks from the date of receipt of certified copy of this order. In the event any such representation is made, exercise mentioned in aforementioned paragraphs- (i) & (ii) shall be completed by the District Magistrate as early as possible preferably within four months from the date of communication of this order."
It appears that when no proceeding was being undertaken, those petitioners of PIL before this Court had preferred a Contempt Application (Civil) No. 5225 of 2019 which was disposed of with a direction to the opposite party to comply with the direction of writ Court and intimate to the party within a week from the date of order i.e. 16.08.2019. It appears that pursuant to the above directions as contained in the PIL, the authorities have proceed to consider the matter of removal of unauthorized encroachments from the public passage/ road and accordingly three member committee, which includes the District Magistrate also, passed resolution to the effect that first the marking will be done on the alleged encroachments and after the marking survey will be conducted and if in survey the marked portion is found to be of unauthorized then a proper notice would be issued to the concerned parties giving them opportunity of hearing before carrying out any demolition exercise or removal of encroachments by the district administration. This has come to be so recorded in the resolution of three members committee and accordingly we do not see any justification qua the apprehension of the petitioner that the demolition exercise will be carried out of their existing constructions without putting them to notice.
Learned Standing Counsel is directed to supply the copy of instructions to the learned counsel for the petitioners during the course of day.
In view of the above, therefore, the writ petition is disposed of with a direction to the respondent district administration to act strictly in accordance with law and as per resolution passed on 27.11.2019.
Writ petition thus disposed off and consigned to records.
Order Date :- 28.11.2019 IrfanUddin (Ajit Kumar,J.) (Ramesh Sinha,J.)