IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE, ANDHRA PRADESH AT HYDERABAD (Special Original Jurisdiction) THURSDAY, THE TWENTY EIGHTH DAY OF AUGUST TWO THOUSAND AND EIGHT PRESENT THE HON'BLE MR JUSTICE C.V.NAGARJUNA REDDY WRIT PETITION NO : 366 of 2005 Between: Dasari Ramadas Reddy, S/o.D.Chenga Reddy, 6-7-557, Sripuram Colony, KT Road, Harekrishna Marg, Tirupathi, Chittoor District. ..... PETITIONER AND 1 The Mandal Revenue officer, Ramachandrapuram, Chittoor District. 2 The District Collector, Chittoor. 3 The Commissioner of Land Administration, Govt. of A.P., Hyderabad. 4 The Govt., of AP rep.by its Principal Secretary, Revenue (Assn.IV) Department, Secretariat Buildings, Hyderabad. .....RESPONDENTS Petition under Article 226 of the constitution of India praying that in the circumstances stated in the Aﬃdavit ﬁled herein the High Court may be pleased to issue a writ of Certiorari calling for all the connected records including the impugned order of the fourth respondent in Memo No.21665/Irrigation IV (2)/2004-1, dated 4-1-2005, and quash the same as illegal, improper, unjust, arbitrary and contrary to law and further direct the respondents herein to consider the case of the petitioner for grant of assignment of the land in survey No. 34/3 of C.Ramapuram Village of Ramchandrapuram Mandal to an extent of Ac.5.16 cents under ex-servicemen quota and pass such other order or orders. Counsel for the Petitioner:MR.K.SATYANARAYANA MURTHY Counsel for the Respondents: AGP FOR REVENUE The Court made the following : THE HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE C.V.NAGARJUNA REDDY WRIT PETITION No.366 of 2005 ORDER: In this writ petition, the petitioner called in question Memo No.21665/Assn.IV(2)/2004-1, dated 04.01.2005, of respondent No.4, whereby his request for assignment of Ac.5.16 cents in Sy.No.34/3 of C.Ramapuram village of Ramchandrapuram Mandal, Chittoor District was turned down. 2. The petitioner is an Ex.Serviceman. He claimed that in anticipation of assignment, he occupied the aforementioned extent of land and approached the respondents for assigning the said land under Ex.Servicemen quota. The request of the petitioner was considered at diﬀerent levels. It is not in dispute that the land in respect of which the petitioner is claiming assignment is classiﬁed as a “Kunta Poramboke”, the assignment of which is prohibited by A.P.Board Standing Orders 15 (4) (h). Initially, the petitioner made a representation to respondent No.2-District Collector, Chittoor, with a request to assign the aforementioned extent of land, and the same was forwarded to respondent No.1-Mandal Revenue Oﬃcer, Ramachandrapuram, Chittoor, who in turn has addressed letter, dated 19.02.2004, to the Executive Engineer, Irrigation Division, Tirupati to give a status report of the land and no objection certiﬁcate for taking further action. In this connection, the Executive Engineer, Irrigation Division, Tirupati, addressed letter, dated 28.04.2004, wherein he stated that the land is a Kunta with a bund of 1.20 metres height on eastern side and a minor intercepted catchment. He opined that the Kunta may receive the ﬂows from the intercepted catchments only and that the capacity of Kunta is 60.00 meters x 40.00 meters x 0.60 meters = 1440 cubic meters and the approximate water spread area is 2400 sq. meters or 0.59 acres. He further opined that as per the local enquiry, the Kunta is not receiving water since many years and there are also no feeder channel and surplus course. He ﬁnally opined that the said Kunta does not come under the purview of irrigation department, but according to his technical opinion, the land can be assigned subject to the condition that necessary consent may be obtained from the concerned Gram Panchayat to the eﬀect that the proposed land for assignment is not intended for use by it for public purpose or Government use. When this report was forwarded to respondent No.2, after examining the same, he made an endorsement on 02.07.2004 to the eﬀect that the request of the petitioner could not be considered as the land was classiﬁed as Kunta Poramboke and that there is a ban for assignment of water course poramboke. The petitioner was advised to select some other alternative land. Aggrieved by this order, the petitioner approached respondent No.4 for assignment of the same land. After receiving the report from respondent No.2, respondent No.4 passed the impugned order rejecting the request of the petitioner for assignment. 3. Sri K. Satyanarayana Murthy, learned counsel for the petitioner, submitted that in view of the opinion given by the Executive Engineer of Irrigation Division, Tirupati, there is no justiﬁcation for the respondents to deny assignment of the said land to the petitioner. He also relied on the resolution passed by C.Ramapuram Gram Panchayat, wherein it conveyed no objection for granting patta to the petitioner. 4. The need to protect water bodies hardly needs any emphasis. In Intellectuals Forum, Thirupathi vs State of A.P. & others[1] the Supreme Court held as under: “The responsibility of the State to protect the environment is now a well-accepted notion in all countries. It is this notion that in international law, gave rise to the principle of “state responsibility” for pollution emanating within one’s own territories [Corfu Channel Case. ICJ Reports (1949) 4]. This responsibility is clearly enunciated in the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment, Stockholm 1972 (Stockholm Convention), to which India was a party. The relevant clause of this Declaration in the present context is Paragraph 2 which stated: “The natural resources of the earth, including the air, water, land, ﬂora and fauna and especially representative samples of natural ecosystems, must be safeguarded for the beneﬁt of present and future generations through careful planning or management, as appropriate.” Thus, there is no doubt about the fact that there is a responsibility bestowed upon the Government to protect and preserve the tanks, which are an important part of the environment of the area. Sustainable Development The respondents, however, have taken the plea that the actions taken by the Government were in pursuance of urgent needs of development. The debate between the developmental and economic needs and that of the environment is an enduring one, since if environment is destroyed for any purpose without a compelling developmental cause, it will most probably run foul of the executive and judicial safeguards. However, this court has often faced situations where the needs of environmental protection have been pitched against the demands of economic development. In response to this diﬃculty, policy makers and judicial bodies across the world have produced the concept of “sustainable development”. This concept, as deﬁned in the 1987 Report of the World Commission on Environment and Development (Brundtland Report) deﬁnes it as “Development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of the future generations to meet their own needs”. Returning to the Stockholm Convention, a support of such a notion can be found in paragraph 13, which stated: “In order to achieve a more rational management of resources and thus to improve the environment, States should adopt an integrated and coordinated approach to their development planning so as to ensure that development is compatible with the need to protect and improve environment for the benefit of their population.” Subsequently the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development, passed during the Earth Summit of 1992, to which also India is a party, adopts the notion of sustainable development. Principle 4 of the declaration states: “In order to achieve sustainable development, environmental protection shall constitute an integral part of the development process and cannot be considered in isolation from it.” It is true that the tank is a communal property and the State authorities are trustees to hold and manage such properties for the beneﬁts of the community and they cannot be allowed to commit any act or omission which will infringe the right of the Community and alienate the property to any other person or body.” 5. Admittedly, the land chosen by the petitioner is a watercourse poramboke. Even according to the Executive Engineer of Irrigation Department, this is a water body with water spread area of 2,400 sq. metres. It is also not in dispute that under the A.P.Board Standing Orders, assignment of watercourse poramboke is prohibited. There is, therefore, hardly any justiﬁcation for the petitioner to claim assignment of such a watercourse. Interestingly, while the Executive Engineer stated that the said watercourse does not fall within the purview of the Irrigation Department, he oﬀered his technical advice, which in my opinion is wholly unwarranted. The Gram Panchayat in passing the resolution does not appear to be concerned with the public interest. With the gradual decimation of water bodies, the very survival of mankind is threatened. As held by the Supreme Court, there is urgent need to protect water bodies. 6. In this view of the matter, I do not ﬁnd any illegality in the impugned order passed by respondent No.4. The petitioner cannot claim any vested right to select a particular piece of land, even if he is entitled to assignment under the quota of Ex.Servicemen. As rightly opined by the Collector, the petitioner can always choose a land, which is more suitable and unobjectionable for carrying on agricultural operations. 7. With these observations and liberty to the petitioner to approach respondent No.2 for assignment of an alternative land under Ex.Servicemen quota, the writ petition is dismissed. No costs. _______________________ C.V.NAGARJUNA REDDY,J 28.08.2008 v v [1] AIR 2006 SC 1350