DHARMA PAL DUA Vs. LUCKNOW DEVELOPMENT AUTHORITY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) HEARD learned Counsel for both the parties and perused the record.

(2.) LEARNED Counsel for the LDA has with reference to the objections filed against this appeal submitted that the LDA is willing to offer a plot of 28.80 sq. metres (4 small plots of 7.20 sq, metres each) in Vishal Khand -1, Gomti Nagar, Lucknow on the currently applicable rate of Rs. 11,000 per sq. metre. The total sum payable by the complainant figures as Rs. 3,05,607 but the complainant says that he is not in a position to pay this amount and the LDA on the other hand is not willing to offer the aforesaid plot on the same rate as paid by the complainant in the year 1987. In the backdrop of this obstinate attitude of the parties a crucial question which has to be determined by this Commission is:

(3.) AT the very outset it may be observed that is, the complainant/appellant is a poor person and in the year 1970 when the commercial plots/shops were offered by the LDA at the site located behind the Paper Mill Colony he applied for a plot and he deposited the requisite sum as required by the LDA. Thereafter, he kept on waiting for a long period of seventeen years for the lease deed to be executed in his favour but even the execution of the lease deed was of no avail as the possession over the allotted site to the complainant could not be handed over to him on account of the said piece of land having already been encroached by the land grabbers. This fact has not been denied by the LDA. Since it is a recurring cause of action and the complainant was sincerely requesting the LDA authorities for an alternative plot he filed his complaint in the year 1995. As his 'claim' and 'right' both were admitted to the LDA and perhaps it was on account of this reason that the LDA allotted to him a bigger plot of 150 sq. metres i. e. 1600.14 sq. ft. i. e. four times larger than the plot originally allotted to him and that too for a price of Rs. 3,75,000. This offer for the complainant was as a mountain -load which he could not bear and afford to pay. Except denial there was no other alternative available to him and he was justified in doing so as he was not economically sound person. But the fact remains that his claim for a plot of his need was well recognized by the LDA during the pendency of his complaint in the year 1999. Therefore, question of his complaint being barred by time would ever arise and what more important to note is that till 1999 i. e. during the pendency of the complaint the LDA was willing to accord a due recognition to the complainant's valuable right of possession of the land in respect of which a lease deed had already been executed in his favour more than twelve years ago. The recognition of his right fully entitles him to have a plot of the similar area for the same price. Now the latest offer for allotment of four small pieces of land totalling in measurement to 28.80 sq. metres for a price of Rs. 3,05,607 is as onerous as the earlier offer made in the year 1999 was. The complainant who has been denied for his right for the last four decades is still a poor person and cannot afford to pay as submitted by his learned Counsel, the said huge amount. Moreover, a question is as to who is at fault and the answer must figure out in his favour and against the LDA.