Karnataka - Bangalore   

Amargol layout scheme quashed

BANGALORE: The Karnataka High Court has quashed the Amargol village scheme drawn up by the Hubli-Dharwad Urban Development Authority and directed it to hand over land it had acquired to the original land owners.

A Division Bench, headed by Justice D.V. Shylendra Kumar, passed the order on appeals by Ningamma Patil and others, all of Amargol village, challenging the acquisition of their land by the authority for forming a residential layout.

Amargol is one of the many villages located between the twin-cities of Hubli and Dharwad.

The authority had, in 2000, come up with the scheme for forming residential layout on 88.6 acres of land.

Land belonging to Ningamma and others came to be acquired for the project.

Subsequently, several survey numbers were deleted and the land to be acquired shrunk from 88.6 acres to 45.2 acres.

Taking the Government to task for “selectively picking and choosing” land for acquisition and subsequently deleting them, the Bench said, “We have noticed that the State Government in the initial stage, and later the authority itself, have acted in an unreasonable, whimsical, arbitrary manner, systematically excluding chunks of land from the scheme.”

It noted that the authority framed the scheme on November 14, 2000, covering 88.6 acres of land.

The Government then stepped in and deleted some land for acquisition, leaving the project to cover 57.7 acres.

Then the authority decided to de-notify some more land and the scheme was reduced to being implemented on 45.22 acres.

The Bench said, “This is a clear case of pick and choose, as some persons are able to get their land excluded from the scope of acquisition, while the helpless, poor and gullible persons are left languishing.”

The Bench allowed the writ appeals and quashed the scheme.

The Bench also directed the urban development authority to return all the land it had acquired for the purpose.

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