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NEW DELHI: Delhi's most controversial land acquisition litigation involving the influential Sitaram Bhandar Society has ended in the government's
favour with the Supreme Court asking the authorities to take over 1.8 acres of land and imposing a cost of Rs 1.8 lakh on the trust and religious body.

Despite a notification of November 13, 1959, and a subsequent award of the collector in 1980 to acquire over 30,000 acres of land in the Mehrauli area for the planned development of Delhi, the Sitaram Bhandar Society kept obstructing the acquisition of its 1.8 acres of land by resorting to litigation on one pretext or the other.

The curtains over the stretched out litigation were drawn by a Bench comprising Justices Dalveer Bhandari and Harjit Singh Bedi, which said: "The society has been able to frustrate the acquisition and development of the land right from 1980 onwards by taking recourse to one litigation after the other."

The Sitaram Bhandar Society is a registered trust and a religious body managing three temples in Pilani, Rajasthan, and several gardens and water tanks having religious significance. It had recently set up the Birla Naturopathy and Yoga Centre at Pilani.

The apex court noted that all the suits and writ petitions filed by the society had been dismissed by various courts and disapproved the manner in which the religious body had stretched its right to legal remedy to frustrate the land acquisition done almost 30 years ago.

"Undoubtedly, every citizen has a right to utilise all legal means which are open to him in a bid to vindicate and protect his rights, but if the court comes to a conclusion that the pleas raised are frivolous and meant to frustrate and delay an acquisition which is in public interest, deterrent action is called for," said Justice Bedi, writing the judgment for the Bench.

"This is precisely the situation in the present matter," the Bench said and, while dismissing the society's appeal against a Delhi High Court judgment, ordered it to pay a cost of Rs 2 lakh. It also directed the Delhi Administration to immediately proceed against the society.

Source : Times of India