KAMAL MIXED FERTILIZERS Vs. STATE OF RAJASTHAN

JUDGEMENT

(1.) BY this petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, the petitioner has prayed that the order by the Director of Industries, Rajasthan, Jaipur dated August 20, 1974 by which the allotment of plot No. 30(P) in the Industrial Area, Alwar made in favour of the petitioner has been cancelled and the earnest money deposited by the party forfeited on account of the alleged failure of the petitioner to set up the industry on the said plot within the time prescribed in the lease deed and the Rajasthan Industrial Area Allotment Rules, 1959 (which will hereinafter for the sake of shortness be referred to as the Rules), may be quashed.

(2.) THE relevant facts giving rise to this petition are these : THE petitioner which is a partnership firm, applied to the Government of Rajasthan for allotment of some land in the industrial area, Alwar and by a lease deed dated August 27, 1970 (Exhibit-1) plot No. 30-A measuring 3.75 acres was allotted to the petitioner on lease for a period of 99 years for the purpose of setting up a pre-mixed granulated fertilizers industry within a period of two years from the date of taking over possession of the land. Admittedly the petitioner got possession of the land on August 22, 1970. THE petitioner's case is that on account of its failure to obtain raw materials for setting up the said industry, it could not carry out the condition of putting up that particular industry for which the lease had been granted in its favour, even though it had raised some construction on the plot. Consequently the petitioner applied to the Government that it may be permitted to put up a barium component industry instead of granulated mixed fertilizers industry. An application to that effect is stated to have been made some time in 1971. Unfortunately for the petitioner, it could not obtain the requisite material to start even a barium component industry. In the meanwhile, there was some change in the personnel of the firm also and, therefore, the Government was approached that the lease may be converted in favour of M/s. Pioneering Products instead of M/s. Kamal Mixed Fertilizers in whose favour the lease had originally been granted This M/s. Pioneering Products, it is stated, was able to secure a process for manufacture of Paraffin Max from Slack Max. THE matter pertaining to the change in the name of lessee as also change in the type of industry remained pending before the Department of Industries. But the petitioner neither succeeded in getting the lease changed in the name of M/s. Pioneering Products nor in getting another type of industry substituted in place of granulated mixed fertilizers industry for which the lease had been taken. A lot of correspondence passed through the petitioner and the department in this connection, which has been mentioned and reproduced in detail in the writ petition,

(3.) IT is also clear to me that the condition for setting up the industry within the prescribed period of two years is obligatory unless the period of two years is extended by the Government for valid reasons. IT is also further clear that on failure on the part of the lessee to set up the industry within the prescribed period, the land shall revert to the Government. The reversion appears to be automatic and no adjudication is required for the same. The relevant clauses of the lease deed reproduced above give a right to the Government of re-entry on the land and taking possession of the same All that the Director of Industries has, therefore, done by the impugned order in the present case is to have intimated to the petitioner that on account of the breach of the terms of the contract on the part of the petitioner, the land stood reverted to the Government. In these circumstances, I am of opinion that the impugned order is not liable to be be quashed on the simple ground that the Director of Industries, Rajasthan, Jaipur was not competent to pass any such order.