BHARAT SANCHAR NIGAM LIMITED Vs. STATE OF PUNJAB

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The crux of the facts, which needs a necessary mention for a limited purpose of deciding the sole controversy, involved in the instant writ petition and emanating from the record, is that Royal Shahi Samadhan situated at Patiala, was declared a protected Monument by the Department of Cultural Affairs, Archeology and Museums, Punjab, vide Notification dated 27.02.2009 (Annexure P/1), in view of the provisions of The Punjab Ancient and Historical Monuments & Archaeological Sites and Remain Act, 1964(hereinafter to be referred as "the Act"). During the course of enquiry, it revealed that the office and tower of the petitioner Company-BSNL (for short "the petitioner-Company"), are existing on the protected monument area, without any sanction/permission of the Competent Authority. Exhibiting the great concern and the entirely unsatisfactorily manner, with which the protected monument and their property are preserved or maintained by the State Government, the First Division Bench of this Court, issued the following directions, by virtue of order dated 04.10.2008 rendered in Civil Writ Petition No. 17704 of 1997:-

(2.) Sequelly, the Punjab Government has empowered the Deputy Commissioners to remove all the encroachments on the declared protected monument vide Notification dated 24.03.2009. In exercise of these powers, the Deputy Commissioner, Patiala, passed the ejectment order and the petitioner- Company challenged the same through the medium of Civil Writ Petition No. 15333 of 2009, which was disposed of along with Civil Writ Petition No. 15164 of 2009. This Court set aside the eviction order and permitted the petitioner- Company to file reply to the show cause notice and the respondents were directed to decide the matter expeditiously, after providing the opportunity to the petitioner- Company, by way of order dated 23.12.2009 (Annexure P-4).

(3.) In pursuance thereof, the Deputy Commissioner issued a show cause notice dated 12.08.2009 to the General Manager of the petitioner-Company, for removal of the encroachments of their office and tower, which are being run, without any authority in the declared protected monument area under Section 30(1) of the Act and was directed to remove the encroachments within a period of 15 days, failing which the proceedings under Section 31 of the Act, were proposed to be initiated.