NAGRIK VIKAS PARISHAD Vs. STATE OF MAHARASHTRA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India takes exception to the change of user proposed by the respondents vis-a-vis land bearing C. S. No. 433 to 438 at 12th Lane Kamatipura, Bombay-400 008.

(2.) THE aforesaid land was reserved as a playground in the sanctioned Development Plan of E Ward, Greater Bombay. An Urban Renewal Scheme has been in the pipeline since the year 1976. It required tremendous resources and the scheme was to depend upon financial assistance from the World Bank. For various reasons, not relevant to be mentioned here, assistance from the World Bank was not forthcoming. The Prime Ministers Grant Project was formulated sometime in the year 1986-87. The object of this project was to take over and demolish dilapidated cessed buildings and replace the same with several and expanded structures to be made available to a larger number of residents vis-a-vis those who got dishoused as a result of the take-over and demolition. The land afore-mentioned was made over by Respondent No. 4 (BMC) for being dealt with under the PMG Project. As a whole, the land admeasures about 2, 050 sq. mts. Instead of keeping the entire land or at least 1,860 sq. mts. thereof as an open recreational ground, respondent No. 1 in consultation with respondents 4 to 6 agreed to a change in the user. The change was that 1,050 sq. mts. of land would be kept open and 1,000 sq. mts. to be built up. But the structure that is to come up on the built-up area will be on stilts at a height of 3. 8 mts. The ground underneath excluding the pillars was to be left unbuilt and utilisable as a recreational ground. The structure that is to come up on the 1,000 sq. mts. is to house 240 dishoused families from Kamatipura in self-contained blocks, each having a carpet area of 180 sq. ft. The building is likely to be completed within 18th months of the commencement of the construction. Those to be rehabilitated are presently in transit camps having come there following crashes and demolitions of buildings in Kamatipura area.

(3.) THE petitioners object to the variation in the land user by the respondents. According to them the variation has not been preceded by the steps required under sections 21 to 31 of the Maharashtra Regional and Town Planning Act, 1966 (hereinafter referred to as the Act ). It was only recently i. e. in April 1989, that petitioners heard of the move to de-reserve the said land from the category of a recreational ground. At the least, the proposed variation constituted a change of substantial nature and unless the same was notified in the Official Gazette and the local newspapers and objections invited and considered, it could not be enforced. Instead of waiting for all this, the respondents had commenced digging and uprooting activities The public had not been consulted before effecting the change, and petitioners, in particular, would be seriously prejudiced if the variation was allowed to go through. The de-reservation was ultra vires the Act as also Article 14 of the Constitution of India. Petitioners sought a declaration to that effect and a consequential injunction to restore the absolute reservation of the user as a recreational ground and further restraining respondents from carrying out any operations in furtherance of the proposed variation.