MOHAN CHANDRA MONDAL Vs. STATE OF WEST BENGAL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Heard learned Advocates appearing for the parties.

(2.) A very innocuous prayer has been made in this writ application seeking direction to learned Tribunal below to dispose of pending O.A. No. 1421 of 2011 (LRTT) as early as possible. We have heard learned Advocates for State and private respondents respectively. They have also no objection for expeditious hearing of original application. It is the further submission of learned Advocate, Ms. Dutta, appearing for the writ petitioner that the original application has been posted to the Third Bench, a non-functioning Bench as there is no Presiding Judge. Learned Advocate, Mr. De, Additional Government Pleader, however, submits that if any direction is passed for early disposal of original application by a Bench which is functioning now, it will cause difficulty to dispose of the case by learned Tribunal as at the present moment only two Benches of learned Tribunal are functioning due to the fact that there is no Judges to constitute other two Benches and First Bench which is now functioning, also will be non-functioning in view of retirement of Hon'ble Presiding Judge in January, 2012. We appreciate the problem as to be faced by learned Tribunal, but at the same time we cannot reject anxiety of litigants for expeditious hearing of their cases by Land Tribunal. There are so many cases pending before us where grievance made that their cases are pending for long time.

(3.) The Chief Secretary, Government of West Bengal accordingly is directed to bring this fact to the notice of Hon'ble the Chief Minister, Government of West Bengal to take appropriate steps in consultation with the Hon'ble the Chief Justice of High Court, Calcutta to fill up vacancies as early as possible. Recently as it is understood from the Bar that Central Government for Constitution of Bench of Central Administrative Tribunal has taken a policy decision to appoint learned Advocates experienced in the subject to hold the post of member of said Tribunal and already many Advocates have been appointed. It is suggested that said posting may be adopted by State Government also to solve the problem and it will help proper functioning of tribunal by younger persons than the retired Judges. We expect that there will be no dearth of members of learned Tribunal to constitute the four Benches and there will be proper functioning of that.