MUNICIPAL COUNCIL Vs. TILAK RAM KRISHAN CHAND

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioner-Municipal Council filed a suit for declaration to obtain the invalidation of a sale deed (No.3251 dated 9.2.2001) executed by it in favour of (respondent-defendant) and also applied for the restraint of the latter from alienating that property any further.

(2.) The plea was allowed by the learned Civil Judge (Senior Division), Sangrur, vide order dated 24.7.2007. However, in appeal, the learned Additional District Judge, Sangrur reversed it in part inasmuch as it restrained alienation of only 16 sq. yards area which was not a part of the original tenancy.

(3.) The property in suit concededly belongs to the petitioner herein which leased it out to the defendant-respondent in the year 1955 for a period of three years which period came to be extended thereafter from time to time. The Government of Punjab (vide its memo No.10/18/94-2LG3/8027 dated 20.7.2000) announced a policy that the commercial property rented out by the Municipal Council may be disposed of in favour of the existing tenants/occupants on payment at the rate of 50% of the market value of the property to be determined by the District Level Committee headed by the Deputy Commissioner. In pursuance of that policy, the Deputy Commissioner, Sangrur, formed a sub-committee which at its meeting held on 20.10.2000 fixed the rate of property at Rs.15,000/- sq. yard. The Deputy Commissioner specifically ordered that the property shall not be sold at a price of less than Rs.15,000/- per sq. yard. The currency period of that scheme was noticed in the notification itself to be six months and, in that view of things the scheme was to be valid upto 19.1.2001. The formulation further indicated that if an occupant/tenant was not able to get the sale deed registered within the prescribed limit, the Deputy Commissioner would be obliged to get the market value of that property reassessed and it is only on payment of the reassessed value that the sale deed would be got registered.