Madras High Court Reserves Orders on Encroachment in Bethel Nagar

The Madras High Court has reserved orders on matter involving encroachments in Bethel Nagar at Injambakkam

The bench of Chief Justice Munishwar Nath Bhandari and Justice D Bharatha Chakravarthy were hearing a contempt of court petition filed by one I.H Sekar, Managing Trustee of "The Nature Trust". The contempt petition was filed against the non-compliance of orders passed by the court in a previous writ filed by this petitioner.

The writ petition was filed seeing direction to remove the encroachments made in the marsh lands and canal puramboke area complying with the orders of the Supreme Court in Hirch Lal Tiwari v. Kamala Devi and Ors and in accordance with Tamil Nadu Land Encroachment Act, 1905 and direct to retrieve these lands.

This writ petition was disposed off with directions to confirm the validity and authenticity of the alteration and in case the alteration is unauthorised, to take action against the defaulting officers. It was also directed that since the eviction of unauthorised occupants is a periodic exercise, a fresh exercise may be undertaken after giving notice to all concerned to clear the land.

The court had directed the District Collector to conduct this exercise and to file a status report within two months with proper site plans and photographs of the area.

The case of the petitioner is that the order was passed in 2015 and there have been various postings before this court for reporting compliance. In the last posting, the court had even granted one year time to carry out the exercise of regularization/eviction of the encroachers based on the survey conducted by IIT Madras

The petitioners believe that the respondent officials are seeking to regularize the encroachments in gross violation to the various directions of the court. The petitioners argue that the respondents are willfully defying the directions of the court by attempting to favor and benefit the illegal encroachers and cause huge loss of assets

The petitioners have therefore filed the contempt petition as the court had already held that no further orders are necessary in the above matters

Earlier, the Additional Advocate General had submitted a status report to show part compliance of the judgement. it was submitted that the buildings constructed and put to use for commercial purposes have been sealed and during the course of the day, the electricity connection would be withdrawn. the court had taken the status report on record. The court had then directed the Advocate General to intervene in the matter and point out who are the occupiers and when the land was occupied/encroached by them and while not endorsing the encroachment, how the issue is to be resolved taking into consideration the legal provision as well as the Government policy.

Based on the direction of the court, on 08.02.2022, the Advocate General submitted that information had been submitted by many persons regarding occupation of land for residential purpose with certain details and that few occupiers were yet to give the details regarding date of occupation of land. Later, on 15.02.2022, the Advovate General submittedt that since the documents submitted by the encroachers to support their statement was not legible, the Government would make necessary verification based on records and a decision to re-locate the encroachers would be taken.

The court however drew attention to the Apex Court decision in the case of Rameshbhai Virabhai Chaudhari v. State of Gujarat where the apex court had not permitted regularisation of grazing land. The Apex Court had held emphatically that grazing land should be used only for the purpose for which it is permitted and no encroachment on such land is permissible.

The court highlighted that in light of the law enunciated in the decision of the Apex Court, any liberty to the Government to regularise the encroachment is nothing but to promote the encroachment by process of law also.

"It is for this reason that at first people would encroach government land and then the Government would pass an order to regularise By such regularisation, the tendency to make encroachment is going to increase, which is otherwise seen by us day in and day out. This clarification was made in reference to what best can be arranged for the solution already given by the Government that is regarding allotment of land elsewhere and not regularisation."

The court had stated that the scope of contempt is very limited and therefore, the court cannot accept the arguments raised by the counsel for applicant even on the applications preferred by them in the contempt petition.

The court has heard the matter in detail and has reserved orders.

Case Title: I.H Sekar vs. MR P. Ponniah, IAS and 2 Ors

Case No: CONT P/1874/2018

Click here to read/download order