The order dismissing the petitions was pronounced in the open court this morning by a division bench of justices Jasbir Singh and RK Garg. The development is significant as residents of the area have been agitating for a long time against acquisition of land. Local member of Parliament Pawan Kumar Bansal had already extended full support on the issue to the residents. He had even asked the administration to put on hold the process to acquire land for the IT park in Shastri Nagar in Manimajra.
Arguing instead of acquiring agricultural land the administration should utilize the land it already had, Bansal, in a letter to former UT administrator SF Rodrigues had said the land acquisition in the Shastri Nagar area had left 5,000 residents in distress.
The case saw the UT administration and the home affairs ministry talking different stands on the issue. The former has been defending the acquisition of 272 acres of land for the IT park’s third phase, while the ministry, in its special audit report, called it completely unjustified. It insisted since a huge chunk of plots in the first and second phases of the project were lying vacant, further land acquisition was uncalled for.
The report had stated the administration officials’ keenness to acquire land from farmers and allot it to businesses without going through the prescribed procedure had put a question mark on their intentions.
In the Chandigarh Technology Park there is no uniformity of rates, procedures or policy in allotting land to various beneficiaries. The UT administration, while handling government assets, needs to exercise some care in disposing it. The safeguard of assets was one of the administration’s responsibilities and it has failed miserably in this the reported had stated.
Part of the Dream Weave Walk Network 1998-2012