HON'BLE SRI JUSTICE C.V.NAGARJUNA REDDY WRIT PETITION No.22986 of 2010 Date 06.10.2010 Between: M/S.GTL Infrastructure Ltd. ..... PETITIONER AND The Gram Panchayat rep. By its Sarpanch, Bhogapuram Village, Pedavegi Mandal, W.G. District. .....RESPONDENTS Counsel for the Petitioner : Sri Ganta Rama Rao Counsel for Respondent :Sri M.Prabhakar Rao HON'BLE SRI JUSTICE C.V.NAGARJUNA REDDY WRIT PETITION No.22986 of 2010 ORDER: This Writ Petition is filed for a Mandamus to declare the action of the respondent in not disposing of the petitioner’s application dated 20.02.2010 for grant of permission for erection of the ground based tower in Sy.No.142/1, Bogapuram Village, Pedhavegi Mandal, West Godavari District and interfering with the erection of tower by the petitioner as illegal and arbitrary. Sri Ganta Rama Rao, learned Counsel for the petitioner, submitted that under the Andhra Pradesh Panchayat Raj Act 1994, there is no provision for obtaining permission from the respondent for erection of tower over a private land. This Court in M. Balaram v. Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited Hyderabad & others (W.P.No.10884 of 2010) while dealing with an identical issue held as under:- “At the hearing, the learned counsel for the petitioner submitted that under Section 99 of the Andhra Pradesh Panchayat Raj Act, 1994 (for short, “the Act”) it is incumbent upon respondent Nos.1 and 2 to obtain permission from respondent No.3 Gram Panchayat for erection of cell tower and that as no such permission has been obtained, they are not entitled to erect the same. I have carefully examined the provisions of Section 99 and I am of the view that the said provision is attracted only where the owner or occupier of any building proposes to put up verandahs, balconies, sunshades, weather frames and the like to project over a public road vested in such Gram Panchayat. The learned counsel also relied on Section 121 of the Act in this regard. The said provision is not attracted either, because it pertains to the requirement of permission to be obtained from the Gram Panchayat for construction of a building. Section 2(3) of the Act defined ‘building’ as including a house, out-house, shop, stable, latrine, shed (other than a cattle shed in an agricultural land), hut, wall and any other such structure whether of masonry, bricks, wood, mud, metal or other material whatsoever. In my opinion, a metallic structure, which does not have any characteristic of house, out-house, shop, stable etc., does not fall within the definition of building. The words “whether of masonry, bricks, wood, mud, metal or other material” used in the said definition were preceded by the words “such structure” which necessarily means the structures such as house, out-house, shop, stable, latrine, shed etc., as mentioned in the earlier part of the definition. Therefore, this contention of the learned counsel is rejected.” In view of the above decision, which applies in all fours, this Writ Petition is allowed. The respondent is restrained from interfering with the erection of tower by the petitioner over the private land. It is, however, made clear that if the petitioner seeks to erect the tower in any part of the land belonging to the respondent, it is entitled to interfere with such erection. As a sequel to disposal of the main petition, WPMP.No.29338 of 2010 filed by the petitioner for interim relief is disposed of as infructuous. C.V. NAGARJUNA REDDY,J Date:06.10.2010 usd