Calcutta High Court (Appellete Side)
The Suburban Agriculture Dairy & ... vs The State Of West Bengal & Ors on 21 March, 2016
Author: Debasish Kar Gupta
Bench: Debasish Kar Gupta
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21.03.2016
srm
W.P.L.R.T. No. 777 of 2004
The Suburban Agriculture Dairy & Fisheries Pvt. Ltd. & Anr.
Versus
The State of West Bengal & Ors.
Mr. Suman Kumar Dutt,
Mr. Atish Ghosh,
Mr. Souvik Ghosh
...for the Petitioners.
Mr. L.K. Gupta,
Mr. Chandi Charan De,
Mr. Hiranmoy Bhattacharya
...for the State.
Mr. Sakya Sen,
Mr. Suvadeep Sen
...for the Respondent No.10.
Mr. Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharya, Mrs. Aparna Banerjee, Mr. Malay Kumar De, Mr. P.S. Basu ...for the Respondent No.9.
Mr. Prosenjit Basu, Mr. Tapan Nag Chowdhury, Mr. Parikshit Basu ...for the Respondent No.5.
The subject matter of challenge in the above writ application is a judgment dated October 6, 2004 passed by the West Bengal Land Reforms and Tenancy Tribunal in the matters of (1) Suburban Agriculture Diary & Fisheries Pvt. Ltd. Vs. State of West Bengal & Ors. (T.A. No.59/03 (LRTT) (W.P. No.1323 (W)/98, (2) Suburban Agriculture Diary & Fisheries Pvt. Ltd. Vs. State of West Bengal & Ors. 2 (O.A. No.723/03 (LRTT), (3) Peerless Hospitex Hospital Research Centre Ltd. Vs. State of West Bengal & Ors. (O.A. No.1166/03 (LRTT), (4) Dipak Kumar Mukherjee Vs. State of West Bengal & Ors. (O.A. No.807/02 (LRTT) (W.P. No.9705 (W)/99 & 5. Gopal Chandra Mondal Vs. State of West Bengal & Ors. (O.A. No.3528/02 (LRTT).
The operative part of the judgment impugned is quoted below:
"In view of above discussions and directions L.R.T.T. doth set aside and quash notice dated 16.12.2002 demanding from Peerless Rs.5,03,616,00 (Rupees five crores three lakhs fifteen thousand and six hundred sixteen) only as damage fee. L.R.T.T. also doth set aside and quash the action of the appropriate authorities under the Act by taking over possession of sold part of Dag No.1 and makes it clear that if Suburban is allowed to retain the sold part of Dag No.1 upto the ceiling limit under the Act then the appropriate authorities should once again take possession of that part of the sold part of Dag No.1 which Suburban will not be allowed to retain under Section 6(1) of the Act, immediately.
In these terms T.A. No. 59/03 (LRTT) (W.P. No.1323 (W)/1998, (2) O.A. No.723/03 (LRTT), (3) O.A. No.1166/03 (LRTT), (4) O.A. No.807/02 (LRTT) (W.P. No.9705 (W)/1999), (5) O.A. No.3528/02 (LRTT) are disposed of. All interim orders, except those passed today, are vacated. Let a plain copy of the order duly countersigned by the Principal Officer of the Tribunal be made over to the Ld. G.R. for communication to the concerned authorities for information and compliance and xerox certified copies to the applicants, if applied for, on payment of requisite court fees."
By virtue of an order dated January 6, 2009 an interim order has been passed in this writ application for maintaining a status quo in respect of the land in question is in existence.
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It is submitted by Mr. Sakya Sen, learned Advocate appearing on behalf of the respondent No.10, that permission for construction of viaduct for Metro Railway on a plot of land lying and situated at Mouza Chak Garia, J.L. No.26, R.S. Dag No.1, District-South 24-Parganas, amongst other plots of land, has been given to the above applicant by the Metro Railway authority under a communication bearing Memo No.MRTS/W-90/49B/Pt.III dated November 22, 2012. The above construction is a part of the construction of Metro Railway line from Kavi Subhash (New Garia) to Dum Dum Airport (32 km) sanctioned by the Government of India in the year 2010-2011. According to Mr. Sen, the above construction cannot be continued in view of the interim order passed in the matter.
At this juncture a suggestion is received from all the parties to modify the interim order of status quo after securing reasonable amount of money at the instance of the Metro Railway authority for continuing with the above construction work of viaduct under reference without prejudice to the rights and contentions of the parties in this writ application.
In compliance of the order dated February 29, 2016 read with the order dated March 8, 2016, Sri Aswini Kumar Kapoor, General Manager of the respondent No.9 is present before us today.
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It is submitted by Mr. Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharya, learned Senior Advocate appearing on behalf of the Metro Railway authority, on instruction, that the Metro Railway authority ensures that all sorts of necessary steps will be taken up for construction of the viaduct under reference expeditiously. He further submitted that a competent authority under the Metro Railways (Construction of Works) Act, 1978 has already been appointed for discharging the function under Section 13, amongst others, of the above Act.
In view of the above, we direct the above competent authority under the Metro Railways (Construction of Works) Act, 1978 to determine approximate valuation of the land in question with the co-operation from the Inspector General of Registration, Government of West Bengal and to produce a report by way of filing affidavit on the next date of hearing to enable us to proceed further with the prayer for modification of the interim order in this writ application. The Inspector General of Registration, West Bengal will be at liberty to depute a competent officer for rendering such co-operation to the Metro Railways authority under his supervision.
The hearing of this writ application stands adjourned to March 30, 2016 and this matter will appear in the Daily Supplementary Cause List on that date under the same heading.
The personal appearance of Sri Aswini Kumar Kapoor is dispensed with. 5 Photostat plain copy of this order duly countersigned by the Assistant Registrar (Court) be given to the parties on usual undertakings.
( Debasish Kar Gupta, J. ) (Md. Mumtaz Khan, J.)