Supreme Court quashes arbitrary land allotment to housing society in Mumbai at then CM's instance

New Delhi: The Supreme Court has quashed the allotment of land made to a cooperative housing society in Mumbai in 2008 at the instance of then Maharashtra Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh, finding it completely arbitrary, not proper and in violation of the procedure and the eligibility criteria.

"Land is a precious material resource of the community and therefore the least which is required from the State is transparency in its distribution," a bench of Justices Sudhanshu Dhulia and Ahsanuddin Amanullah said.

Allowing a plea by another cooperative housing society, the court, in its judgment on December 12, quashed the allotment of the plot made on April 10, 2008, in favour of Medinova Regal Cooperative Housing Society (MRCHS), despite repeated cancellation of letter of intent by senior officers due to the personal intervention by the Chief Minister each time.

The society initially made a request to the Maharashtra Chief Minister in 2000 for allotment of a plot at Bandra, for members of the applicant society who worked in Tata Memorial Centre, a leading hospital and research institute for cancer, as they do not own any house, despite living in Maharashtra for the last 20 years or so.

"The entire history of how the plot came to be allotted to MRCHS shows nepotism and favouritism for a society which was not even eligible in the first place for this allotment. A perusal of the records shows that not a single member of the society, is a doctor at Tata Memorial Hospital. Leave aside a doctor, not one member is an employee of Tata Memorial Hospital which was the projection earlier and for which the plot was sought to be allotted. The composition of this society has also now completely changed from its original composition," the bench said.

Though a letter of intent was issued in 2003 for a different plot than the one applied for, the senior officer cancelled it in 2004, due to a change in the composition of society members, but the Chief Minister remarked “Please resubmit the file with the latest position".

Within months, the Joint Secretary again recommended for cancellation of the letter of intent, but the Chief Minister again intervened and directed scrutiny of the second proposal.

This time, the Principal Secretary (Revenue) on May 17, 2005, recommended cancellation due to again change in the composition of society members and their ineligibility. However, on April 03, 2006, the Chief Minister sent the file back with the remarks “Last opportunity be provided to the society and concerned Collector should complete the action.”

"This direction sounds more like a command given by the Chief Minister. Once this direction was given by the Chief Minister, things started moving smoothly for MRCHS as the Joint Secretary found 13 members out of their 29 members to be eligible for granting final membership. Consequently, a Letter of Allotment was issued in favour of MRCHS on 10.04.2008," the bench noted.

The bench found after 8 years and countless changes in the membership of the society the land was allotted to them, that too a different plot than the one they applied for. The court also pointed out that the composition of the proposed MRCHS has changed thrice already, yet they are afforded another opportunity by the Chief Minister.

Finding the allotment as vitiated, the bench emphasised there has to be transparency in matters of allotment of land by the government, adherence to the above rules and regulations becomes important in the cases of allotment.

"But unfortunately, all this is completely missing in the present case where allotment was made in favour of MRCHS in total violation of the prescribed procedure," the bench said.

On a plea by appellant Proposed Vaibhav Cooperative Housing Society Limited, the court set aside the Bombay High Court's judgment of 2012 which dismissed their writ petition and declined to interfere in the allotment made to MRCHS.