Chandigarh: Resumption order of site set aside after 35-year ‘delay’

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The matter relates to a shop-and-office (SCO) in Sector 7 that the Estates Office had flagged building violations on April 1, 1979. The owner had filed an appeal against the order in May, 2013 which was dismissed in September, 2014 on grounds that there has been a delay of 35 years in filing the appeal.

The petitioner challenged the decision before UT Adviser. Counsels of the petitioner, SK Jain and Vikas Jain, submitted that on receipt of the show cause notice, the petitioner had directed the tenants to remove the building violation as the premises was in possession of tenants. The petitioner appeared before the estate officer on November 6, 1978 and said he was ready to remove the building violations and the case was adjourned to November 13, 1978 with the directions to inspect the site.

Thereafter, the tenants informed the petitioner that violations have been removed and therefore, the petitioner did not appear before assistant estate officer (AEO) on next date of hearing.

The counsel pleaded that the petitioner came to know about the resumption order on April 18, 2013 when the officials visited the site and informed the petitioner that the site stands resumed on account of building violations. The counsels for the petitioner submitted all the non sanctionable violations have been removed.

The adviser remanded the case back to the chief administrator with directions that where the non sanctionable building violations have been removed by the owners and where the delay is more than 10, 20 or 30 years, all the cases be decided afresh after giving due and proper opportunity of being heard to the parties.

During the re-hearing of the case, the petitioner explained the reasons for delay and submitted that they never came to know about the resumption orders and the authorities also woke up only on April 18, 2013 when the premises was visited.

After hearing the appellant, the chief administrator said the inspection report confirmed that the violations had been removed. The chief administrator added that the Act provides that in case of any violations, the action must be taken within 6 months. The estate office was required to do its duty and remove the violations on its own at the expense of the owner. However, in this case, no concrete action appears to be taken by the estate officer to set right the violations. Moreover, the Punjab and Haryana High Court also observed that resumption is very harsh measure and same be restored to only in extreme circumstances.

Therefore, the appeal for setting aside the resumption order was accepted. The chief administrator directed the estate office to calculate the amount of penalty to be imposed on the owner.