KRIPA RAM Vs. DY COMMISSIONER

JUDGEMENT

(1.) BY this judgment we propose to decide some common question; of law arising in these writ petitions, which have been referred to this Bench after one of us, namely, Honble the Chief Justice had entertained -doubts about the constitutional validity of Sections 3 and 4 of the Prevention of Ribbon Development Act, (Act No: XXVI of 2007 Samvat) (hereinafter the impugned Act) while hearing arguments in writ petition No: 76 of 1972. The features which are common to all these writ petitions are, that all the buildings have been constructed along side the Pathankote -Jammu -Srinagar -Uri national highway and all the orders requiring these buildings to be pulled down have, been issued by the respondents under S.R.O. 509 dated 28 -10 -1970.

(2.) BRIEFLY put, the grounds urged in support of the petitions are: (i) As power to make laws in respect of national highways vested exclusively in the parliament under entry No: 23 of the Union List contained in the Seventh Schedule to the Constitution of India, the State legislature had no competence to pass the impugned order. (ii) Section 3 and 4 of the impugned Act were ultra vires the Constitution of India, inasmuch as they violated Articles 14, 19 and 31 of the said Constitution; (iii) Under section 3 of the impugned Act, the Chief Engineer alone was competent to issue notifications fixing the distance of the intended buildings from the centre of the road, as such SRO 509 was issued by the Government without jurisdiction; and (iv) Section 3 of the impugned Act did not apply to the Pathankot -Jammu -Srinagar -Uri national highway. The last two grounds though not germane for determining the vires of Sections 3 and 4 of the impugned Act, were yet argued at length by the learned counsel who wanted an authoritative pronouncement from this Bench on these grounds as well. This is how we have decided to deal with these grounds as well.

(3.) IN order to avoid needless repetition we propose to mention exhaustively the pleas in reply taken by the respondents while discussing the aforesaid grounds in the later part of our judgment. We now proceed to deal with these grounds ad -riatim. Ground No. 1 :...