Functioning of Estate Office will soon be streamlined, UT Admn tells HC

CHANDIGARH:Four days after the Punjab and Haryana High Court questioned the UT Finance Secretary (FS) on steps initiated to clean Augean stables in the Estate Office, the Chandigarh Administration today claimed that the functioning would soon be streamlined.

Saurabh Malik

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, October 12

Four days after the Punjab and Haryana High Court questioned the UT Finance Secretary (FS) on steps initiated to clean Augean stables in the Estate Office, the Chandigarh Administration today claimed that the functioning would soon be streamlined.

As the case came up for resumed hearing before the Bench of Justice Rajiv Narain Raina, the counsel for the Chandigarh Administration assured the court that the functioning of the Estate Office would soon be smoothened and made more effective.

The Bench was also assured that the common man would also be able to deal with his property issues in a fair manner.

Taking up the matter, Justice Raina verbally asked the FS to consider the feasibility of a more effective online system. Three weeks’ time was also given to the Administration. The FS and the Assistant Estate Officer were present in the court during the hearing.

Justice Raina, on the previous date of hearing, had hauled up the Chandigarh Administration for being at loggerheads with the judiciary. Also castigating it for not adopting “positive thinking”, Justice Raina had further directed the FS to appear before the court and explain firsthand “what is happening”.

He was asked to spell out the steps taken to clean Augean stables in the Estate Office and directed to consider “whether it would be appropriate for this court in the present case to open a controlled window for grievance redressal for the common man…”

Justice Raina had added there was abject failure on the part of the Administration to act in accordance with law and within a reasonable time frame. “It is well to remember patience too has limits of endurance while even metals suffer fatigue”.

The rap on the knuckles came in the case of Sanjay Majithia and other petitioners against the Chandigarh Administration and other respondents. In the case, the court passed an order on April 24, 2014, directing the Administration to mutate a property to the extent of 75 per cent undisputed ownership in the petitioners’ names.

However, steps were not taken by the Administration to enter the mutation in the record of rights despite the directions. In the meantime, a suit filed in the matter was decreed on February 27 in the petitioners’ favour and they became the owner of 100 per cent share in the suit property.

Taking up the matter, Justice Raina asserted the civil court decree came into existence on February 27 in the petitioners’ favour, after the suit was decreed and they declared owners of the remaining disputed 25 per cent. However, even after eight months, mutation was not sanctioned.

“The UT Administration appears to be at loggerheads with the civil court and this court in this matter with its functionaries throwing a spanner in the works,” Justice Raina had added.