RATI RAM Vs. DELHI DEVELOPMENT AUTHORITY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE present petition had been filed by the petitioners in September 1992 claiming inter alia that a plot of land measuring 1127 square meters (11 Bigha 17 Biswas), which forms part of Khasra No.144/84 situated in the revenue estate of village Sarai Sahaji, Delhi, has been jointly purchased by various persons including their ancestors much prior to the year 1948-49. THE petitioners claimed that ever since then, they and their family members had remained in actual cultivatory possession and occupation of the said land, constructed various structures on the land including a boundary wall to secure the plot of land and invested large sums therein. Some photographs were enclosed with the petition to show the cultivatory possession and occupation of the petitioners in the land in question.

(2.) THE entire claim of the petitioners to the subject land is predicated on a Jamabandi entry in the revenue records of the respondents relating to the year 1948-49. As per the petitioners, on 26.09.1992, the officers of respondent No.2/Archaeological Survey of India (in short ,,ASI'), visited the property in question and started to interfere in their peaceful possession of the subject land. Apprehending their alleged illegal dispossession, the petitioners had filed the present writ petition stating inter alia that the subject land had neither been acquired by the Government, nor had the property in question been notified under the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Sites and Remains Act, 1958 (hereinafter referred to as ,,the Act') or under the Public Premises Act or any other Statute and, therefore, the petitioner should be permitted to enjoy their peaceful cultivatory possession in the subject land.

(3.) THE stand of respondent No.2/ASI as taken in its counter affidavit was that the petitioners did not have any locus standi to file the present writ petition and they are encroachers/trespassers on the land in question. It was further averred that the subject land is a vacant land, which falls within the limit of the historical monument, namely, "Sarai Shahji", which is a protected monument under the Act and is under the sole control and ownership of respondent No.2/ASI. THE monument has been described as a unique piece of the Mughal period comprising of a Palace, Mosque, Graveyards of Farid Murtaza Khan and the ruins situated in the land adjacent to the land in question. Further, it was averred that despite the protection notice and other instructions issued by the ASI, the petitioners had encroached upon a part of the land and sought to grab the same. When the aforesaid unlawful action of the petitioners was objected to by the officials of respondent No.2/ASI, they were threatened with dire consequences. This occasioned the matter to be reported to the local police on 15.09.1992.