The Grama Panchayath vs The Chief Secretary on 7 July, 2014

[Cites 3, Cited by 0]

Karnataka High Court

The Grama Panchayath vs The Chief Secretary on 7 July, 2014

1. In spite of pendency of the petition for two years, the petitioners, which include an institution of local self Government, have not come forward with any details of the allegations made in the petition and learned counsel for the petitioners has repeatedly relied upon a vague averment as under:

"Few photographs evidencing the manner in which the entire tank beds are destroyed by using all machineries like Earth movers and Earth Diggers, bulldozers etc., are herewith produced and marked at ANNEXURE-D1 to D4."

The petitioners have repeatedly relied upon the photographs annexed to the petition to submit that illegal mining of sand is going on in the district of Kolar with the additional similarly vague averment as under:

"This Writ Petition is presented to ameliorate the poor pathetic situation of the Agrarian sector of people in the Taluk to say sizeable segment of the society owing to the poverty, ignorance social and economic disadvantages cannot themselves assert and the authorities are ruled by the moneyed persons having 6 political, money and muscle power and extraneous factors resulted in failure on the part of executive as well as legislators in inflicting environmental imbalance and assault on environment resulted in a serious threat to the entire agricultural sector and population which is more than 30,000 to 50,000 people dependent on the age old water storage tanks in the villages stated above bringing justice for socially and economically disadvantaged class of people particularly the agriculture dependent population in the rural areas. Hence this petition filed by the public interest of Mulabagil Taluk.

"3. The Mafia of sand mine particularly from the city of Bangalore are ruling the entire Taluk hand-in-glove with the public authorities particularly the Mines and Geology, Police, Revenue officers obviously the authorities are keeping quite encouraging the sand mafia to excavate the natural sand in the Tanks, Tank beds and tank bunds and agricultural lands."

2. The petition is drafted in the above way without any specific averment about any incident or the persons involved in any particular activity which is alleged to be illegal. Not only that the petition is filed by an institution of 7 local self Government, but initially they have joined two members of Legislative Assembly, one of whom was the District In-charge Minister, besides 18 other respondents including the Chief Secretary, State of Karnataka.

3. Unfortunately, the jurisdiction of this Court for taking up some cause in public interest has been so grossly abused with complete misunderstanding of fact and law and in such manner that the petitioner comes before the Court with absolutely vague allegations and their counsel pleads only for an enquiry in the nature of investigation and refers only the legal provisions made in the relevant law for its enforcement. Such litigations ultimately do not serve any public cause, but could be put to the use of collateral purposes and may temporarily attract some publicity without any positive result. It is also surprising that learned counsel appearing in such petitions would never, before drafting the petitions or arguing at great length, try to ascertain and establish the facts on the basis of which allegations are made and care to join such parties as could be held responsible for the alleged acts of illegality.

4. Upon learned Additional Government Advocate being called upon to respond to the allegations made in the 8 petition, it is specifically stated, on instruction of Senior Geologist, that he is the proper designated officer under the relevant provisions and rules to whom a specific complaint should have been made, if an instance of alleged theft of sand or illegal sand mining were to be reported to any authorized officer. However, regardless of any of the petitioners approaching the appropriate authority for the Kolar District during the year 2011-12, 17 cases of illegal mining have already been registered, 690 lorries have been seized and Rs.81,11,715/- have been collected as fine, besides registering 27 criminal cases under the provisions of the Indian Penal Code. Learned AGA further submitted that, if any private individual or public spirited person has specific information or grievance, he ought to have and could have approached the appropriate authorities concerned with the extraction and transportation of sand. None of the petitioners having taken any of such actions, the petition is obviously an attempt at just moving the High Court directly by joining 20 parties as respondents, even as none of the vague allegations could be specifically replied by any of the respondents.

5. Under the above circumstances, it is clear that the present litigation is a product of thorough misconception or an attempt at just calling the respondents to the Court with complete lack of bona fide or sincerity on the part of the petitioners.

6. Under the circumstances, the petition is dismissed and the first petitioner being a Grama Panchayath, there is no order as to cost. However, a warning is issued to the petitioners, as also their counsel to save public time of the Court by not filing and carrying such litigations for years of hearing.

Sd/-

CHIEF JUSTICE Sd/-

JUDGE bkv

Unlock Advanced Research with PRISMAI

Karnataka High Court