KALAWATI SINGH SMT Vs. DISTRICT MAGISTRATE COLLECTOR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioner Smt. Kalawati Singh challenges the order of the District Magistrate, Balia dated 6.12.1999 whereby a sum of Rs. 2,13,999/- has been directed to be recovered from the petitioner on the supposed charge that the said amount has been wasted in constructing the building of the Panchayat Bhawan in village Gayghat, District Balia. Challenging the said recovery order Sri S.K. Singh, learned Counsel for the petitioner has also urged that political considerations seem to have been reigned supreme when the action under challenge was initiated against the petitioner and that may have the reason that the District Magistrate was persuaded to pass an order which was and is against the wishes of the people and also against the subsequent resolution of the Gram Sabha.

(2.) On entertaining the writ petition, respondents were called upon to file counter affidavit and by an interim order dated 13.1.2000, the operation of the order of the District Magistrate was stayed. From the order sheet it transpired that no counter-affidavit was forthcoming and as such a stop order was passed granting one week and no more to the respondent's Counsel to file counter- affidavit. However, the attempt of the Court to have a reply from the respondents has gone in vein, thus the matter has been taken up for decision on merits.

(3.) The actual controversy, however, surrounds a very small issue. Two plots of land, perhaps adjoining each other, because their numbers 374 and 375, have been allocated for construction of a dispensary on one and Panchayat Bhawan on the other. When the construction of the Panchayat Bhawan was taken up on of these plots, the erstwhile Pradhan (whom the petitioner succeeded) raised an objection about the correctness of the plot number. The complaint sent to the District Magistrate saying that the aforesaid construction should be taken as unauthorised because the plot over which the dispensary was to come up was being used for constructing the Panchayat Bhawan. The District Magistrate appears to have set up an enquiry which was sent down to the Tahsildar level. Views of the citizens living in or around the area concerned were ascertained. Measurements also seem to have been taken. Reports have been annexed as Annexures 3 to 9 in the writ petition. With the contents of these annexures remaining intact as those have not been denied by filing any counter-affidavit though enough opportunities have been extended, it is apparent that those reports, including that of the S.D.M., contain the consistent view prevailing that no error or illegality was involved if the Panchayat Bhawan comes up where it was being constructed. So much so that the Gaon Sabha passed a resolution to the effect that the Panchayat Bhawan should be completed very expeditiously where it was being constructed by the petitioner and the land which may have been earmarked earlier for the Panchayat Bhawan, may be interchanged for construction of the dispensary.