Bombay HC stays demolition order of property owned by Anil Parab’s aide

A single-judge bench of Justice Milind N Jadhav was on January 5 hearing a plea by Kadam challenging the December 6, 2023 demolition notice.

Representing Kadam, advocates Shardul Singh and Prerna Gandhi submitted that the dispute began when the property at Khed was purchased on February 8, 2007 by five partners of the firm, two of them were Kadam and one Vijay Bhosale.

Singh submitted that through a consent award from May 2017, the dispute between the partners was settled, Bhosale retired from the firm and Kadam was entitled to the land in question. Bhosale never challenged the consent award, therefore it became final, Kadam argued.

In light of this, Kadam sent an application to the sub divisional officer seeking permission to grant non-agricultural (NA) status for the property. He obtained this permission on August 3, 2021. Thereafter, he developed a resort on the said land based on further approvals.

On October 26, 2023, Kadam received a show-cause notice from the Additional Collector on the basis of a private complaint filed by Bhosale, who alleged Kadam breached the NA permission. Kadam contested the show-cause notice, however, the Additional Collector on November 24 passed an order revoking the NA permission and set it aside.

Singh said that Kadam had filed a statutory appeal against the same, which is pending, despite repeated requests by Kadam seeking a stay on the revocation order. On December 8, Kadam received a notice for demolition of the construction carried out on the said land, which he challenged before the HC.

“At this stage, it needs to be noted that once the Respondent Bhosale stood retired from the partnership firm and the said land having come to the entitlement of the petitioner by virtue of the consent Award, any such private complaint by Bhosale in respect of the Khed land alleging breach of NA permission granted in favour of the Petitioner was not prima facie maintainable at all, despite which the issue has proceeded further,” Justice Jadhav noted.

The judge added that the facts before him were ‘extremely strong’ and ‘serious’ and the HC’s intervention was required “so as to ensure that no litigant or party can take advantage of the legal system for granted and file innocuous complaints”.

The HC stayed the demolition notice and directed that no coercive steps shall be taken by the concerned authorities against the petitioner’s resort. It also directed that no hearing be conducted in Kadam’s statutory appeal till further orders.

Seeking affidavits in reply from respondents within two weeks followed by a rejoinder from the petitioner in a week’s time, the HC posted the matter for further hearing for February 2.

Kadam is in judicial custody in connection with a case filed by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) for alleged irregularities in the construction of Sai Resort in Dapoli area of Ratnagiri district. The HC had denied bail in the case to Kadam last month.