*THE HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE N.V. RAMANA +Writ Petition No. 4926 of 2008 % Dated 13.11.2008 # Industrial Development Bank of India Limited, A Government banking Company having its registered office at IDBI Tower, WTC, Complex, Cuffe Parade, Mumbai 400 005 and Staff Training College at Gachibowli, Hyderabd, rep through its Deputy General Manager BSK Kiran, S/o late B. Hezekiah, having its office at Gachibowli, Hyderabad. ..... PETITIONER VERSUS $ State of Andhra Pradesh, rep by its Secretary (Revenue) Secretariat, Hyderabad and others. .....RESPONDENTS ! Counsel for Petitioner: Sri M. Varaprasada Rao ^ Counsel for Respondents: GP for Revenue < GIST: > HEAD NOTE: ? Cases referred: THE HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE N.V. RAMANA W.P. No. 4926 of 2008 O r d e r: The petitioner, namely the Industrial Development Bank of India Limited (IDBI), which is a company registered under the provisions of the Companies Act, 1956, represented by its Deputy General Manager, has ﬁled this writ petition praying for the following relief: To issue an appropriate Writ, Order or Direction more particularly one in the nature of Writ of Mandamus declaring the action of the 6th respondent in issuing notice in proceedings No. B/1045/2007, dated 10.12.2007 informing the petitioner that instructions have been issued by the 3rd respondent in Lr. No. LC1/16308/2007, dated 30.11.2007 to resume an extent of Ac.10.00 guntas of land in Sy. No. 91 under the possession of the petitioner and subsequent resumption of alleged unutilized land to the extent of Ac.10.00 guntas in Sy. No. 91 so as to enable him to allot in favour of Commissioner and Inspector General, Registration & Stamps, Andhra Pradesh, Hyderabad as arbitrary, illegal, perverse and violative of Articles 14 and 21 of the Constitution of India and in gross violation of principles of natural justice and fair play and set aside the same in the interest of justice and pass such other order or orders. The petitioner has diversiﬁed its banking business by introducing a range of products and services both in corporate banking and retail banking segments. The petitioner states that Jawaharlal Nehru Institute of Development Banking, known as JN IDBI Staﬀ College, is one of its educational arms. It is a prestigious and premier training institute of international standards, established by erstwhile IDBI, catering to the development of employees of the petitioner and also employees of various other banks, including foreign banks in the areas of ﬁnance, management and organization behaviour in India and other developing countries through training, research and consultancy programmes and assignments. It also oﬀers training and development solutions to the employees of the petitioner, other development banks, commercial banks, especially in public sector and ﬁnancial institutions in India and other developing countries. The petitioner states pursuant to its decision set up an apex level Training Institute in Development of Banking activities at Hyderabad, a team of oﬃcials made a detailed survey and selected the land situated adjacent to Central University Campus, and accordingly, approached the respondent-authority by making an application dated 10.07.1980, requesting to allot lands to an extent of Ac.1.00 or thereabout in Sy. No. 91 of Gachibowli village, Ranga Reddy District, for setting up such training institution of international repute. Pursuant thereto, the District Collector, vide Lr. No.D2/12026/80, dated 19.07.1980, requested the petitioner to submit the minimum requirements of land as the extent of land sought by them was exorbitant. Thereafter, a joint meeting was convened on 16.07.1980 between the petitioner and the Assistant Secretary to the Government, Industries and Commerce Department, which was held in the chambers of the Chief Secretary, and it was agreed to scale down the request to Acs. 50.00 at the rate of Rs.15,000/- per acre, and the balance extent to be considered later, as was done in similar cases. Accordingly, after negotiations, the Government handed over possession of an extent of Acs. 50.00 in the year 1982, and subsequently on, it issued G.O. Ms. No. 895, dated 16.09.1987 alienating an extent of Acs.50.00 in favour of the petitioner. In the said G.O., the petitioner was directed to pay Rs.25,000/- per acre, and accordingly the petitioner paid an amount of Rs.5,00,000/-. The petitioner states that in the Ac.50.00 of land allotted to it by the Government, they have constructed 16 Nos. Staﬀ Quarters, 76 Nos. single occupancy air-conditions rooms for visiting faculty and participants, 3 Nos. Lecture Halls and 10 Nos. Syndicate Rooms, ergonomically designed library with over 5,000 books and journals, Computer Centre with 36 Nos. state-of-the-art computers, scanners, printers and equipped with other gadgets and essential accessories with LAN connectivity and 24 hour internet facility, air-conditions auditorium/conference hall, multi-cuisine lounge facility, well- lit joggers path, mini gymnasium etc. The petitioner states that it still requires Acs.50.00 for expansion, which has necessitated due to growth of number of branches and other service outlets, change in business structure and there exists a huge backlog of training which can only be addressed by increasing the capacity of the training center, namely additional infrastructure and requisite facilities on the aforesaid lines. The premises are required for conducting training programmes as well as for conducting the programmes to the clients who are reputed PSUs. and PSBs. The training center is dedicated to impart education, knowledge and continued upgradation of skills, which in turn generate a good number of professionals and skilled and trained employees who beneﬁt the banking and ﬁnance industry and thereby contribute in the national development. This apart, the petitioner has taken up the task of institutional plantation with the assistance of the Forest Wing of the Urban Development Authority. The petitioner thus states that it has undertaken various development works in public interest by setting up Apex Level Training Institute of International repute. While so, the petitioner states that it was surprised to receive a notice bearing No. B/1045/2007, dated 10.12.2007, which was delivered to it on 17.12.2007, advising them to hand over Acs.10.00 of vacant land out of Acs. 50.00 allotted to them on the assumption that the petitioner is in possession of Acs.20.00 excess vacant land, and on the ground that the said land is required for public purpose, without indicating the time within which explanation/objections have to be submitted. However, even before the petitioner could submit its reply/objections, vide proceedings dated 27.12.2007, the Tahsildar, Serilingampally Mandal, passed an order in a summary way for resumption of alleged unutilized land to an extent of Acs.10.00 in Sy. No. 91 of Gachibowli village. The petitioner states that it has plans to make use of the unutilized land, and that it has appointed the Central Public Works Department to undertake the project management consultancy relating to the proposed expansion of infrastructure facilities of the Apex Level Unit as early as in the month of June, 2007, and that it has entered into a Memorandum of Understanding on 22.01.2008, and as requested by the Central Public Works Department, they also deposited an amount of Rs. 50,00,000/-. The learned counsel for the petitioner submits that on the request made by the petitioner to allot Acs. 100.00 of land, the Government, vide G.O. Ms. No. 895, Revenue (Q) Department, dated 16.09.1987, had allotted only Acs. 50.00 of land, at market value, for establishing an International Training Institute of Banking. The petitioner having taken possession of the land, has established therein Jawaharlal Nehru Industrial Development Bank of India, a premier and prestigious International Training Institute. He submitted that the G.O. under which the petitioner was allotted the land, stipulates that the government may resume the land wholly or in part with any buildings thereon, if it is required for public purpose or for conducting mining operations. However, the 6th respondent without ascertaining the facts and the requirements of the petitioner and without conducting any survey as to whether there remained any unutilized land, and if so, whether the same is required for the petitioner, has issued notice dated 10.12.2007, requesting the petitioner to handover an extent of Acs.10.00 vacant land along with the sketch showing the utilization of balance land allotted to. He submitted that that the said order, which is styled as notice, does not stipulate any time limit within which period, the petitioner has to submit his explanation, and in fact, the 6th respondent by issuing the said order and asking the petitioner to handover the extent of land mentioned therein, has even before the petitioner submitting his explanation to the same, has pre-determined that the said extent of land would be resumed to the government. He submitted that even before the petitioner could submit his explanation to the said notice, the 6th respondent has passed ﬁnal orders dated 27.12.2007, resuming the unutilized land lying vacant to an extent of Acs. 10.00, which is not only illegal and arbitrary, but violative of the principles of natural justice. He submitted that the land allotted to the petitioner, is surrounded by a compound wall with security personnel installed at the Entrance Gate, and no person is allowed to enter into the premises of the Institute, and even though permission was denied to the respondents authorities to enter into the land, yet the Mandal Surveyor, has submitted his report stating that an extent of Acs. 20.00 of land remained vacant and unutilized, which is not correct, and therefore, the impugned order passed by the 6th respondent, on the basis of the said report, resuming the land without ascertaining the requirements and needs of the petitioner, has to be declared as illegal and arbitrary and set aside, and more so when the petitioner had utilized most part of the Acs. 50.00 of land allotted to it, and has even entered into Memorandum of Understanding for developing and making use of the balance unutilized land. The 6th respondent, namely the Tahsildar, Serilingampally ﬁled counter. The learned Assistant Government Pleader for Revenue appearing on behalf of the respondents while reiterating the counter averments submitted that a learned Judge of this Court in W.P. No. 4312 of 2007, ﬁled by Sumithranagar Welfare Association, by order dated 19.04.2007, took notice of the fact that most of the governments are housed in private buildings, directed the Government to identify the land and monitor the progress of identiﬁcation of the lands and allotment. Since the petitioner has not made use of the land allotted to it, and an extent of Acs. 20.00 of land remained vacant, the government have decided to resume an extent of Acs. 10.00 of land in public interest, and allot the same to the Stamps and Registration Department to house its Head Quarters and Subordinate Oﬃces, and accordingly, the government having resumed the said extent of Acs.10.00 of land from the petitioner on 28.12.2007 under a cover of panchanama, handed over the same to the beneﬁciary, namely the Stamps and Registration Department on 05.01.2008. He submitted that Rule 6(3) of the A.P. (Telangana Area) Alienation of State Lands, 1975 and Clause 3 of the Conditions for the grant of State land, appended to G.O. Ms. No. 895, dated 16.09.1987, under which the petitioner was allotted the land, empower the government to resume the land if it is required for public purpose, without assigning any reason whatsoever. He submitted that even though the land was resumed and leveled, the petitioner at no point of time, objected to the said leveling, and in fact, ﬁled the present writ petition without making the beneﬁciary, namely the Stamps and Registration Department, a party to the writ petition. The Government, have also sanctioned an amount of Rs. 40.00 lakhs to the Stamps and Registration Department for construction of its building. He thus submitted that no fault can be found with the action of the 6th respondent in resuming the land and allotting the same to the Stamps and Registration Department for making use of the land for housing its Head Quarters and Subordinate Oﬃces, and more so when the petitioner did not submit his explanation to the notice that preceded the impugned order. He thus prayed that the writ petition be dismissed. Heard the learned counsel for the petitioner and the learned Assistant Government Pleader for Revenue for the respondents. Though the petitioner, for the purpose of establishing an International Training Institute for Banking Development has requested the government to allot Acs. 100.00 of land, the fact remains, the Government vide G.O. Ms. No. 895, dated 16.09.1987 had allotted only an extent of Acs. 50.00 of land to the petitioner at market value. The petitioner, admittedly, established the International Training Institute for Banking Development, meeting international standards. The petitioner has created the infrastructure, as stated above, and in fact, is catering to the Banking Development by imparting training to not only to its staﬀ, but all banking institutions in the country and abroad. For the petitioner, to maintain its international standards, it has to create lot of infrastructure, and in fact, has to provide an ambience and environment, which meets the institutional/educational standards, where one can learn and train himself in composed atmosphere. The institutes of international standards should be housed in open places and large extents of land, beﬁtting their international status, and they, at any rate, cannot be housed in the midst of concrete jungles. Though the 6th respondent contends that there remains unutilized land with the petitioner, the material placed by the petitioner before the Court, shows that it has plans to expand its activities, and in fact, has appointed the Central Public Works Department, for creating more infrastructure to meet its growing needs, and has paid an amount of Rs. 50,00,000/- for the said purpose. Clause 3 of the Conditions for the Grant of State Land, appended to G.O. Ms. No. 895, dated 16.09.1987, which enables the Government to resume the land allotted to the petitioner, reads thus: The Government may resume the land wholly or in part with any buildings thereon, if in the opinion of the Government the land is required for a public purpose or for conducting mining operations, in the event of such resumption or in the event of the acquisition of the land for any reason the compensation payable for the land and tress shall in no case exceed the amount paid for them by the grantees or their value at the time of resumption of acquisition whichever may, be less. Though the Government in terms of the above clause, is entitled to resume the land wholly or in part with any buildings thereon, for public purpose or for conducting mining operations, by paying compensation, the fact remains, the 6th respondent before passing the impugned order, resuming the alleged unutilized land, has not veriﬁed whether there exists any vacant land, and if so, whether it was required for the activities of the petitioner, and whether the public purpose for which the land is sought to be resumed, i.e. for providing land to the Stamps and Registration Department for housing its Head Quarters and Subordinate Offices, outclasses the interest of the petitioner, which is running an International Training Institute for Banking Development, and imparting training not only to the staff of the banking industry of the country, but also the world. The 6th respondent, to justify his action, has merely relied on the order relied on the order dated 19.04.2007 of a learned Judge of this Court, passed in W.P. No. 4312 of 2007. The learned single Judge, having considered the need to locate government oﬃces in pucca and permanent buildings of their own, passed the following order: (a) Within a period of one month from today, the Principal Secretary to Government (Revenue) shall require the information from the District Collectors about the oﬃces of various departments of the Government functioning in the rented premises, including the oﬃces of the departments of revenue, forest, transport, social welfare, education, medical and health, roads and buildings, irrigation, Courts etc., (b) Such of the oﬃces and establishments, which are likely to be continued for a period of 10 years and beyond shall be identiﬁed for being located in permanent government buildings. (c) The assignment of government vacant lands within the limits of Municipal Corporations, Municipalities, Major and Minor Gram Panchayats, whenever the government oﬃces mentioned in clause (b) are functioning in private buildings, shall stand frozen till appropriate allocation for such oﬃces is made. (d) Subject to availability of funds, necessary allocation shall be made for construction of buildings in the locations and areas so identified. Having made the above directions, directed the writ petition to be listed for being mentioned on 18.06.2007 to verify the progress made in this regard. From the above order, it is clear that the learned single Judge had merely directed the Principal Secretary to Government to collect information from the District Collectors, about the oﬃces that are located in private buildings, and consider assignment of government vacant lands within the limits of Municipal Corporations, Municipalities, Major and Minor Gram Panchayats, for housing and locating the government departments and necessary allocation for construction of buildings, subject to availability of funds, be made. The learned Judge nowhere directed the respondents to take away the lands that were assigned to public institutions at market value and that too without notice to the said public institutions. The said order, by no stretch of imagination, can be taken to have given licence to the respondents to take away the lands already assigned to institutions for public purpose, without ascertaining their future needs. Therefore, reliance placed by the 6th respondent on the said order of the learned single Judge, is misplaced. It is not the case of the 6th respondent that there is no government land available in the vicinity, and that the land which he sought to allot to the Stamps and Registration Department, is centrally located and is convenient to one and all, particularly the general public. If the 6th respondent required some part of the land of the petitioner, it should have informed the petitioner, and ascertained whether the unutilized land, was useful for it, whether it has any plans to make use of the same, and whether it can spare the same to the government, for allotting the same to some other Department. What all this Court directed in the said writ petition, was to identify vacant lands, but it never said that the lands already allotted for public purposes, and some parts of which are remained unutilized, should be resumed. However, without ascertaining the factual details, and the ground scenario, the 6th respondent has issued the impugned order dated 27.12.2007, resuming the land to an extent of Ac.10.00 to the government. Though the impugned order indicates that notice dated 10.12.2007, was served on the petitioner on 17.10.2007, a reading of the same, would disclose that the same is in the nature of a ﬁnal order, pre-determining that the petitioner has to handover the extent of land mentioned therein. The said notice, neither indicates the time within which the petitioner has to submit his explanation, nor calls upon the petitioner to show cause as to why an extent of Acs. 10.00 of land, should not be resumed, but straight away calls the petitioner to handover the said extent of land. However, even before the petitioner could submit its explanation/objections to the said notice, the 6th respondent issued the impugned order, resuming the land. Since the impugned order, though preceded with a notice, which in fact, is in the nature of a ﬁnal order, did not aﬀord any opportunity to the petitioner to submit its explanation/objections, and sought to take away the rights of the petitioner in the said extent of land, the same cannot be sustained, for the same is not only illegal and arbitrary, but in its issuance, principles of natural justice are glaringly violated. Even though the impugned order refers to the report of the Mandal Surveyor, Serilingampally, along with sketch, indicating the unutilized land in the possession of the petitioner, the fact remains, the respondents have not produced any such report before this Court, and on the other hand, it is the case of the petitioner that their land is surrounded by compound wall, and none, much less the oﬃcials of the 6th respondent, were permitted to enter the premises, much less to inspect the lands. The manner in which the 6th respondent has resumed the alleged unutilized land of the petitioner, which was allotted to them at market value, under the impugned order, shows that the same has been passed mechanically, without surveying the extent of unutilized land, ascertaining the requirements of the petitioner and the ground realities, the competing public interests of the petitioner and the allottee, and more importantly, without aﬀording opportunity to put forth its case for non-resumption. There is no doubt that the government is entitled to allot land to its various Departments for construction of their own buildings, but in doing so, they have to identify suitable vacant land which is centrally located and conveniently accessible to the general public, but certainly they cannot indulge in taking away the lands allotted to other public institutions for public use and purposes long back at market value, and that too without issuing any notice and without ascertaining as to whether the land allotted to them, was made use of them completely, and if any land remained unused, whether it would be used by the for the purpose for which it was allotted, and whether the unutilized land would be required for them for their future developments and expansion. In the above view of the matter, the impugned orders passed by the 6th resuming the alleged unutilized land allotted to the petitioner in an extent of Acs.10.00, cannot be sustained, and is liable to be set aside. Hence, the writ petition is allowed. The impugned orders dated 10.12.2007 and 27.12.2007 passed by the 6th respondent are set aside. No costs. _________________ N.V. RAMANA, J. Dated: 13th November, 2008. KSR