THEN CHENNAI PALAVAKKAM SECTION Vs. GOVERNMENT OF TAMILNADU; SPECIAL COMMISSIONER AND COMMISSIONER OF LAND ADMINISTRATION; DISTRICT COLLECTOR AND ORS

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This appeal has been preferred against the order dated 31.10.2011 passed by the learned single Judge in W. P. No. 9092 of 2009 dismissing the writ petition filed by the appellant-Association.

(2.) The appellant, an Association of Sri Lankan Repatriates at Chennai, started for the welfare of the Sri Lankan repatriates, filed the writ petition seeking to set aside the order passed by the third respondent-District Collector, Kancheepuram dated 4.3.2009 and for a consequential direction to regularise their possession in respect of certain house sites by grant of patta in the names of the respective members. By the order dated 4.3.2009, the request of the appellant-Association for grant of patta to its members in Survey No. 131/10A1 of Palavakkam Village in Kancheepuram District was rejected on the ground that the said land is a patta land belonging to Burmese Repatriates and that alternative accommodation was intended to be provided to them at Kannagi Nagar, Okkiam, Thoraipakkam by allotting a plot to each of them.

(3.) The case of the appellant-Association was that the Government of Tamil Nadu provided house sites for 54 Sri Lankan expatriate families on the basis of the recommendations of the second respondent through the Tahsildar, Saidapet during 1983-1984, on which they had put up thatched sheds. The second respondent had also arranged for funds through Indian Overseas Bank for the purchase of cycle rickshaws for the livelihood of these families and they were also given identification certificates. The respective allottees were paying house tax to the panchayat from the year 1984, ration cards were issued in their names and electricity connections were also provided to their houses. Many of the members of the appellant-Association were engaged as coolies and some were employed in some private companies in and around Palavakkam, and considering their poverty, the Indian Overseas Bank also waived the loans granted to them. The female members of the Association joined in Women Self Help Groups and their children are studying in the nearby schools. The panchayat had also made arrangements to provide cement streets, streets lights and public water taps to their house sites. The alternate accommodation offered to the members of the appellant-Aassociation by the Tamil Nadu Slum Clearance Board at Okkiam-Thoraipakkam measures hardly about 100 square feet and is extremely insufficient for its respective members, as they were already in possession of a 600 square feet building in the present site and it was already under the occupation of illegal trespassers.