HC quashes Shimla MC order on hotel building plan rejection

Legal Correspondent

Advertisement

Shimla, August 30

The HP High Court has quashed and set aside an order of the Municipal Corporation Shimla, whereby the latter had rejected the building plan for a four-storey hotel on the ground that the no-objection certificate (NOC) from the Forest Department was received on April 24, 2018, after the National Green Tribunal (NGT) had passed a judgment restricting the building plan only to two stories plus attic floor in Shimla.

While passing the order, a Division Bench comprising Justice Tarlok Singh Chauhan and Justice Virender Singh observed, “The state authorities have unnecessarily and unduly been influenced by the NGT order, which in the given circumstances was neither attracted nor applicable to the case of the petitioner, more particularly when the petitioner had submitted the building plan on August 3, 2017, much before the NGT order passed on November 16, 2017. The same was even examined and thereafter referred to the departments of the corporation for an NOC. It was also referred to the Forest Department for the grant of an NOC on October 24, 2017, i.e. again prior to the NGT order.”

The court observed that “the instant case is a classical example where on account of the NGT order the respondents, instead of proceeding in accordance with law, have probably developed some kind of fear psychosis and have not proceeded to process the building bylaws even though there was no NGT order against the petitioner.”

The court directed the state authorities to consider the case of the petitioner and if found in order, grant the planning permission on the application/building plan submitted on August 3, 2017, as per the law/rules, as applicable on the said date within three months from today and file its compliance report on November 18.

The court passed the orders on a petition filed by Tarun Bakshi who contended that he had submitted a building plan on August 3, 2017, in respect of blocks A and B for four stories plus parking and four cottages of two stories plus parking in each cottage for sanction/planning permission to the Municipal Corporation for the construction of a hotel. Along with the application, he also deposited a fee of Rs 4,88,972 but the authorities rejected the case on the basis of the NGT order.