URVAKUNJ NICOTINE LTD Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) All these Letters Patent Appeals are preferred from the common oral order dated 27.02.2012 in a group of petitions which are admitted but in which interim relief as prayed in the petitions are refused by the impugned order. Broadly, the background of relevant facts is that all the original petitioners and present appellants were granted separate parcels of land on lease by Kandla Port Trust (for short, "KPT") and the period of those leases had expired in the year 2003 -2004. Thereafter, pending renewal of those leases or grant of fresh leases, they continued to be in possession of the leased lands. Pursuant to and during pendency of a public interest litigation, i.e. W.P.(C) No.11550 of 2009 in the High Court of Delhi, KPT informed the appellants that the period of lease was renewed by the Union of India upto 31.03.2011 and also conveyed its decision not to renew/extend the term of lease and rights thereunder. Therefore, the appellants were called upon by letter dated 26.8.2011 to hand over peaceful possession of the subject land to the Officer on Special Duty (Estate), KPT. Being aggrieved by that decision and communication, the appellants have approached this Court under Article 226 of the Constitution with the prayers, inter alia, to stay further proceeding pursuant to the eviction notice and recovery and/or adjustment of compensation bills, and such interim reliefs having been denied by the impugned order, the appellants have preferred the present appeals. It may be pertinent to note here that, after the impugned order dated 27.2.2012 and filing of the present appeals with civil applications for grant of interim relief, the appeals were taken up for admission hearing in the last week of March, 2012; and after extensive admission hearing for almost three days, the appellants had sought adjournment on the basis that transfer petitions were filed by the appellants in the Supreme Court which were coming up for hearing on 13.04.2012. Thereafter, admission hearing of the appeals was resumed in the third week of June, 2012 and intermittently continued for two weeks with the understanding that the appeals were being heard for final disposal. In the meantime, possession of all the leased lands are stated to have been taken over by KPT, even as proceedings under the Public Premises (Eviction of Unauthorized Occupants) Act, 1971 were initiated and orders of Authorized Officer under that Act were also carried in appeal before learned Additional District Judge, Gandhidham. Some of the appellants herein had even challenged before this Court the denial by learned Additional District Judge of interim relief against the orders of Authorized Officer, and those petitions are also by now dismissed. Thus, in short, the present set of appeals have practically become infructuous. But the appellants having insisted upon order on merits, dealing with their contentions, it has become necessary to deal with the contentions.

(2.) The undisputed relevant facts are that the period of lease in case of each appellant had expired in the year 2003 or 2004. In some of the cases where the lease deed provided for an option to renew the lease, the lessees had applied for renewal and KPT had resolved to renew the lease subject to approval of the Central Government and revision of the rate of rent. While consideration and decision of the Central Government to renew such leases were pending, a writ petition by way of public interest litigation was presented before the Delhi High Court, seeking eviction of the persons in occupation of around 16000 acres of Government land and for direction to lease out such lands to private parties only on the basis of competitive bidding. The petitioners before the Delhi High Court also sought an independent investigation by a special investigation team into the role of officers of the Ministry of Shipping and KPT in allowing illegal occupation of Government land at KPT. On 09.09.2009, the Delhi High Court directed the Union of India not to execute/renew any lease except in accordance with the guidelines issued in the year 2004 by the Ministry of Shipping. By order dated 14.10.2009, interim order dated 09.09.2009 was ordered to be continued. In the order dated 11.11.2009, the Delhi High Court recorded : -

(3.) Even with the above backdrop of facts and elaborate discussion in the impugned order of the contentions of the appellants, it was argued by several learned Counsel appearing for the appellants that interim relief protecting possession by the appellants of the lands in question was required to be granted mainly for the reasons that the decision not to renew the leases or grant fresh leases of the lands to the appellants was arbitrary and illegal; and pending the petitions of the appellants, which have been admitted, the respondents were required to be restrained from dispossessing the appellants of the leased lands. Learned Counsel Mr.Asim Pandya, appearing for some of the appellants, submitted that the appellants as well as hundreds of their employees were sought to be deprived of their livelihood without and before affording to them an opportunity of being heard and without following the procedure established by law. He submitted that KPT and Union of India cannot abdicate their powers and discretion merely on the basis of some statements made by learned Additional Solicitor General (ASG) in the public interest litigation before the Delhi High Court. He submitted that learned single Judge has failed to examine the aspects of balance of convenience and irreparable loss that will be caused to the appellants by refusal of interim relief. He further submitted that this Court is the only appropriate forum which could give complete relief by examining the individual rights of the appellants and no other Court has the territorial jurisdiction to examine the issues raised in the petitions. Arguing on merits, he submitted that Section 49 read with Sections 33 and 34 of the Major Port Trusts Act, 1963 ("the Act", for short) and the Land Policy provided for disposal of land without auction or tender; and the Land Policy of 2004 was not under challenge before any Court. He also submitted that KPT itself had taken a stand before the Delhi High Court that it had no territorial jurisdiction and whenever demand for land was more than the supply, KPT had resorted to tendering process. KPT itself had forwarded cases of 36 lease - holders for renewal for 30 years of the leases to the Ministry and the lands in question were not so much in demand. He fairly conceded that the resolution or the proposal of KPT to renew the leases may not confer any absolute or enforceable right upon the former lease -holders; but they were relevant for the purpose of examining arbitrariness or illegality of the decision to take back possession of the land and not to renew the leases. He pointed out that KPT or Union of India had not even filed any reply -affidavit before learned single Judge and hence their stand could not have been properly appreciated at the admission stage. However, the fact remained that KPT could not point out any urgent requirement of the land for its own use, even as thousands of acres of land were still lying idle with KPT. He also submitted that even the new plan prepared in 2010 provides that all lands are to be utilized for manufacturing of salt and hence no useful purpose would be served by refusing renewal of the leases. By virtue of the renewal clause, some of the appellants had been given an option to apply for renewal of the lease, which created legitimate expectation in view of which the lands have been developed by such appellants after investing crores of rupees. Therefore, invoking the doctrine of legitimate expectation and promissory estoppal, the leases could be directed to be renewed and pending consideration of such pleas, the appellants' possession was required to be protected. He relied upon various judgments in support of his submissions and relevant among them are discussed hereunder.