Court raps Punjab, slaps costs of Rs1 lakh

Saurabh Malik
Tribune News Service
Chandigarh, March 20

Rapping the state of Punjab, GMADA and other functionaries for high-handedness, besides highly arbitrary and perverse approach, the Punjab and Haryana High Court has slapped costs of Rs 1 lakh before directing the refund of over Rs 46 lakh to allottees of a plot. The petitioners will be compensated from the costs.

The admonishment came on a petition filed by Naresh Kumar Aery and another petitioner against the state and other respondents. The Bench of Justice Mahesh Grover and Justice Lalit Batra asserted that a corner plot was put to auction after setting up a higher reserve price “when it was not even capable of being put to use till the time an electricity transformer existed on it”.

The Bench was told that the petitioners purchased a 500 sq yard residential plot in Sector 71, Mohali, in an open auction for Rs 4.05 crore. The reserve price was higher than other plots in the area as it was at the corner. The petitioners paid 25 per cent of the amount in accordance with the terms of the auction, but realised that the plot could not be put to use as there was an electricity transformer. Several representations for removal of the transformer went unanswered.

Frustrated with the respondents’ approach, the petitioners submitted a request for surrendering the plot. In August 2013, the petitioners were allowed to surrender the plot, but deduction and forfeiture of 10 per cent of the total price with interest and penalty was ordered. The amount came out to be Rs 46,72,612.

The Bench asserted that it was of the opinion that the approach of the respondents was highly arbitrary and perverse. Despite several representations, the respondents failed to rectify the defect. As a consequence, the respondents unjustifiably withheld more than Rs 1 crore of the petitioners for the plot incapable of being put to use.

Resultantly, the petitioners were battling for their rights ever since they undertook the “misadventure of transacting with the respondents”. The petitioners’ request for surrendering the plot was an expression of their frustration. Rather than waking up to the situation, the respondents, in a most insensitive way, accepted the plea of surrender and ordered forfeiture of “huge amount” of more than Rs 46 lakh.  The Bench added: “To our minds, there was absolutely no justification with the respondents to do so, particularly, when they themselves were at fault…. We are, thus, of the opinion that this was a case which deserves to be allowed with exemplary costs to 

recompense the petitioners for the loss that they suffered on account of a totally unjustified retention of more than Rs 46 lakh by respondents and forcing the petitioners into litigation for  no fault of theirs.”