Excelsior Correspondent
Srinagar, July 6:High Court today held that the army can take a big chunk of defence land from a private person as her lease had expired and they have the right to re-enter the property with the condition that the occupant be evicted under due course of law.
A big chunk of land in Badami Bagh Army Cantonment was leased out by the J&K Government in 1920 and the lessee sold the property through an attorney and the transfer of lease hold rights was backed by the sanction of the Ministry of Defence in 1962.
The petitioner states that one Kanta Wazir applied for renewal of lease in 2019 and in turn the Cantonment Board authorities issued resumption notice which she challenged before the court.
The authorities contended that the land in question is under the management of Defence Estate Officer, Srinagar and the land was held by K N Raina on Wasidari lease for 40 years only and upon expiry of the lease no renewal of lease was granted as such the land in question has remained in illegal occupation of the petitioner-Kanta Wazir.
They contended that the sanction for resumption of the property was actually granted in 1979 followed by another resumption notice in 1984. However, the same was kept on hold due to the decision taken by the Government of India to maintain status quo on resumption and renewal of Wasidar properties in J&K till the situation normalizes in the Valley.
According to the board-authorities, Government of India has recently taken a decision to resume the subject property for Government purpose and accordingly the resumption notice in August 2020 was issued and duly served upon the occupant-Wazir.
Writ court had already come to the conclusion that there is no justification for the petitioner-Wazir to hold the property indefinitely which is in her unauthorized and illegal occupation through her tenant.
The writ Court, while holding the legality and validity of the impugned resumption notice, has held that the board-authorities are well within their right to resume the property and dismissed the plea of petitioner-Wazir.
Challenging the said judgment of writ court in an appeal, the division bench of Chief Justice Pankaj Mithal and Justice Sanjay Dhar while upholding the decision of writ court dismissed the appeal and upheld the resumption notice issued by the authorities and held the finding of writ court as occupation of property by the appellant unauthorized is well-founded.
Court said that even if the appellant is under unauthorized occupation of property she cannot be thrown out forcibly or in a manner unknown to the law.
“It is only after adopting due course of law that the appellant can be evicted from the property in question and having the right to re-enter and resume the property in question, the authorities have to adopt due course of law”, the DB said.
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