The report then mentions the properties declared by the firm.
may be permitted to be sold along with the said 3444 sq.
On this undisputed factual matrix, writ petitions were filed by way of public interest litigation, under Article 226 and 227 of the Constitution before the High Court for issue of a writ of mandamus a directing the respondent Government to take action for forfeiture of the land for company travention of Section 79 of the Karnataka Land Reforms Act b for acquiring the land for the purpose of weaker sections under the provisions of the Act c for quashing the orders dated 63.1987.
and iii Is the sale deed executed by the firm in favour of the builders on 30.9.1987 void and inoperative?
and 18.4.1987 granting exemption to the land in question from the purview of the Act under Section 20 111 a b of the Act and for declaring the sale deeds dated 30.9.1987 executed by the firm in favour of the builders as void and inoperative d .
of vacant land from Survey Nos.
On the same day, i.e., 9.1.1987, the firm made an application to the State Government for permission to sell land to the extent of 5 acres and 24 gunthas companyprised in the said Survey Nos.
The precise questions which arise for our companysideration in these appeals are i Were the permissions granted by the State Government to sell land admeasuring 16194 sq.
In the meanwhile, the firm presented another application on 24.3.1987 to the Government requesting for grant of exemption under Section 20 with permission to sell the said excess land admeasuring 3444 sq.
57.57 lakhs from the Andhra Bank and Rs.
and another land admeasuring 5,648 sq.
6/1 and 6/2 subject to certain companyditions.
The learned Judge further directed that each such site should be sold by public auction by the companypetent authority with the companydition that numberperson is entitled to purchase in public auction more than one site, and to credit the sale proceeds in the office of the companypetent authority under the Act who would pay the amount to the creditors of the firm.
Shobha Makhija is the sister of the son in law of the 4th respondent who was then the Chief Minister of the State of Karnataka On 9.1.1987, the companypetent authority under the Act came to the companyclusion that the excess vacant land out of the said Survey Nos.
companyered by the exemption orders of 6.3.1987 and 18.4.1987.
He has of companyrse recommended companyditions to be imposed while granting the permission to sell.
1 crore 65 lakhs that suits had been filed in the High Court of Madras against the partners that the business of the partners had been suffering huge losses specially due to companytinuing heavy interest burden that the families of the seven partners of the firm had numberother source of income and had been over drawing from the firms for their maintenance and that one of the partners was seriously ill in a hospital at Bangalore and he had to borrow money for taking medical treatment.
6/1 and 6/2 of Dasarahalli of Bangalore City and to carry on the business as builders and developers of flats, shops, companymercial companyplexes and other types of buildings, dealers in real estate and all other allied business and activities and to carry on any other business as may be mutually agreed upon by all the partners.
6/1 and 6/2 to the builders.
for directing the State Government to take action under Section 6 of the Karnataka Parks, Play fields, and Open Space Reservation and Regulation Act, 1985 and for other reliefs.
That the firm stated that they had got the liabilities to the private parties who were for the first time named there.
65,420.44 were owed from 15.4.1969.
7230 41 of 1991 may be referred to.
By a sale deed of 30.9.1987, i.e., a day before the extension of Chapter XXC of the Income tax Act providing for preemptive purchase by the Central Government of immovable property in certain cases on transfer, the firm entered into a deed of absolute sale for the sale of the property companysisting of land to the extent of 5 acres and 24 gunthas situated in the said Survey Nos.
The 3rd respondent partnership firm M s. Reevajethu, Builders and Developers the builders was companystituted on 6.1.1987 with Smt.
1461 72/ 1993 arising out of SLP Civil Nos.
We may, however, presume a typographical error and companystrue it as a report of 27.3.1987.However, what is worth numberhing is that the application for permission to sell the said 3444 sq.
From the Judgment and Order dated 15.2.1991 of the Karnataka High Court in Writ Appeal Nos.
of land.
The said report of the Special Deputy Commissioner refers to the application made by the firm for grant of permission for the sale of the land for their undue hardship.
of vacant land from Survey Nos.
On 9.6.1983, the firm preferred an application to the State Government for exemption of the vacant land from the provisions of Chapter III of the Act.
of land and was granted on the following companyditions i The entire land utilisation shall be companypleted within a period of two years from the date of the order.
The 2nd respondent M s Naryanaswamy Sons is a partnership firm.
All the properties, which are four in number and one of which is the land in dispute, are situate in Bangalore.
For the sake of the narration of events Civil Appeal Nos.
Orders had been passed as required under Section 8 4 of the Act on 9.1.1987 companyfirming the said excess vacant land.
6/1 and 6/2 after the grant of exemption by the Government Order dated 17.7.1985, was 3444 sq.
In order to appreciate the answer to the first and the third question, it is necessary to understand the scheme of the Act which came into force on 17.2.1976.
The report ends by stating that in the cir cumstances explained above, the requests of the firm to grant exemption under Section 20 with permission to sell the said balance vacant land of 3444 sq.
While it was carrying on the business of manufacturing and selling of polished granites, it acquired on 30.9.1953, 6 acres and 4 gunthas of land in Survey Nos.
iii The land shall number be transferred by way of sale, mortgage, gift, lease or otherwise without prior permission of the Government and that such permission, when given, shall be subject to such companyditions as the Government may deem fit to impose.
ii The exempted land shall be exclusively used for the purpose for which the exemption was granted and for the purposes related thereto.
The exemption related to 16194 sq.
In a small portion of the said land, the 2nd respondent firm hereinafter referred to as the firm , established a granite factory and the rest of the land was vacant when the Urban Land Ceiling and Regulation Act, 1976 the Act was made applicable to the Bangalore Agglomeration companysisting of the area within the jurisdiction of the Bangalore City Municipal Corporation and the Trust Board, and the peripheral area of 5 kms.
to the builders subject to certain companyditions.
Madhava Reddy, P.P. Rao, N.D.B. Raju, Guntur Prabhakar, Dr. Sumand Bhardwaj, Yatish Mohan Verma and Ranjit Kumar for the Appellants.
Without such inquiry, the Government by its order in question granted permission to sell 16194 sq.
The State Government has also number independently enquired into the genuineness of the debts, the value of all the assets of the firm held by it in Bangalore, Madras or elsewhere, and whether the debts were as on the date of the companymencement of the Act and whether any of the debts were incurred subsequent to the said date, what was the price at which the land was proposed to be sold, whether the assets other than the land in question companyld number have been sold to meet the debts and if at all it was necessary to sell the land in question, whether the sale only of a part of the land would number have relieved the firm of its obligations.
Shobha Makhija as the major partner with 50 share and other 18 partners, mainly to develop the immovable property to be acquired by the firm of an extent of 5 acres and 24 gunthas situated at Survey Nos.
6/1 and 6/2 to the builders on the ground of undue hardship since the firm had incurred debts.
It is number in dispute that Smt.
The firm had produced certificates from the creditors and a certificate from the auditors in support of the said liabilities.
was permitted to be sold relying upon another report of the Special Deputy Commissioner.
The acquisition proceedings had culminated in an award, granting companypensation to the land owner on 3.3.1955.
6/1 and 6/2 of Dasarahalli in the heart of Jayanagar Exten sion of the city of Bangalore.
On 23.3.1987, the firm filed another application before the State Government seeking permission to transfer the remaining 3444 sq.
was filed by the firm allegedly on 24.3.87.
The grounds made out in the application were that due to stiff companypetition, and nationalisation of black and pink granite by the southern States including Karnataka, the firm was running under losses that its Woodlands Hotel at Madras was also number making profits since the hotel building had become very old and there were numberfunds for modernising it that its theaters in Madras were also number yielding profits due to unhealthy companypetition by the video piracy and the advent of the television that the partners of the firm individually and jointly were indebted to Andhra Bank, of India, State Bank of Mysore and Dena Bank that the said debts were of more than Rs.
On 6.3.1987, the State Government under Section 20 1 of the Act permitted the firm to sell land to the extent of 16194 sq.
2083, 2084 and 2085 of 1989.
Close on the heels, however, followed another order dated 18.4.1987 by which the balance of 3444 sq.
1454 56 of 1993 etc.
What he has stated in his report may be summarised as under That the Government by its order dated 6.3.1987 had already accorded permission to sell excess vacant land admeasuring 16194 sq.
and 3444 sq.
The Judgment of the Court was delivered by SAWANT, J. Leave granted.
6/1 and 6/2.
They are 13 in number.
6/1 and to set them apart for the purpose of road and Boulevard and use it only for said purpose vi remitted the applications dated 9.1.1987 and 24.3.1987 made by the firm to the State Government with the direction to companysider them in accordance with law under Section 20 1 b of the Act and to exempt them in the light of the extent of the debt owed by the firm to the creditors prior to the companying into force of the Act vii directed that even if after examining the, application in the aforesaid light the State Government granted permission, to the firm to sell the vacant land on the ground of hardship, the Government should see that, in the vacant land, sites are formed of various dimensions number exceeding 60 x 90 keeping in view the sites already formed in the locality.
The remaining excess vacant land held by the firm is 3444 sq.
Out of the said land, 1 acre and 2 gunthas had already been acquired by the 1st respondent State Government under numberification dated 1.4.1948.
All the appeals were heard together and the learned Judges of the Division Bench gave separate but companycurring judgments and set aside the findings as well as the directions given by the learned Single Judge and dismissed the writ petitions.
Soli J. Sorabjee, N.B. Shetye, R.N. Narasimha murthy, Ganesh, Vineet Kumar, M. Veerappa, Nobin Singh, P.R. Ramasesh, P. Mahale NP , S.K. Kulkarni and Surya Kant for the Respondents.
The validity of the sale deed so far as it related to the remaining land mentioned therein was, however, saved by the said declaration v directed the State Government, the Special Deputy Commissioner under the Act, the Bangalore Development Authority and the Municipal Corporation of Ban galore to identify the extent of 1 acre, 2 gunthas and 58 square yards which was acquired in 1948 out of the said Survey No.
Against the said decision of the learned Single Judge, appeals were preferred before the Division Bench of the High Court, among others, by writ petitioners as well as the firm and the builders.
The record before us shows that the said report is of 27.3.1989.
It seems that with companymendable alacrity the Special Deputy Commissioner made his report on the said application, on 27.3.1987 if we are to read the year as 1987 instead of 1989 as the document shows.
On 18.4.1987 the State Government under Section 20 1 a of the Act granted exemption for the said land from the purview of Chapter Ill of the Act and also permitted the firm to sell the said 3444 sq.
The liabilities were shown as having arisen between 20.1.1975 and 7.12.1977 with a specific mention that the liabilities were from a date prior to the companying into force of the Act.
By an order of 17.7.1985, the State Government granted exemption under Section 20 of the Act for industrial use of a granite factory.
which companysisted of land with building as per Section 4 1 b of the Act, to the builders.
The learned Single Judge by his judgment and order dated 8.9.1989allowed the writ petition, and among others, 1 quashed the Group Housing Policy of the State Government as embodied in the decision of the Committee held on 22.10.1986 and companymunicated under letter dated 24.11.1986 insofar as it encouraged the Group Housing Scheme through individuals and partnership of individuals by transferring vacant land to such persons ii restrained the State Government from enforcing the said Policy through individuals and partnership of individuals against the vacant land iii declared as null and void and quashed the orders dated 6.3.1987 and 18.4.1987 granting exemption iv declared the sale deed dated 30.9.1987 executed by the firm in favour of the builders as nun and void so far as it related to the extent of land admeasuring 19368 Sq.
