NAGPUR IMPROVEMENT TRUST NAGPUR Vs. GANESH KULKARNI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This appeal by certificate of fitness granted by the High Court of Judicature at Bombay Nagpur Bench, is directed against its common judgment in Special Civil Applications Nos. 504 of 1967 and 506 of 1967. This appeal was heard along with Appeal No. 2139 of 1968 = (reported in AIR 1973 SC 689) in which we have just delivered judgment. Apart from the points raised in that appeal, the only additional point, which arises in this appeal is whether Section 68 of the Nagpur Improvement Trust Act, 1936 - hereinafter referred to as the Improvement Act - has been violated. This point is not dealt with in the judgment of the High Court. It may be, as contended by the appellants in their statement of the case, that this point was abandoned by the petitioners in the High Court. Be that as it may, we see no force in the point.

(2.) In their petition under Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution, it was alleged that "the petitioner No. 1 on behalf of the petitioners made an application on 1-11-1966 to the respondent No. 1 for abandonment of the land and he also offered to comply with all the conditions and pay development charges, if any, and for permission to convert it for housing purposes." In their application dated November 1, 1966 to the Trust, it was stated that the applicants' property or part thereof was not covered by the Improvement Trust Scheme and this could be released from the scheme. It was, therefore, requested that the applicants' property or part thereof should be abandoned without acquiring it and that the applicants were ready and willing to comply with the terms which may be imposed by the Improvement Trust in that behalf and were ready to execute an agreement for that purpose.

(3.) It appears that the Improvement Trust wrote to the Land Acquisition Officer, Nagpur, on November 15, 1966 intimating to him that the application for abandonment was under consideration and that the matter would be intimated to him in due course. The Land Acquisition Officer was also requested to stay further proceedings for a period of three months.