1 IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY, BENCH AT AURANGABAD. WRIT PETITION NO.4695 OF 2010 Murlidhar s/o Gajananrao Deshmukh ..PETITIONER VERSUS The State of Mah. & anr. ..RESPONDENTS Mr Sachin S. Deshmukh, Advocate for the petitioner; Mr S.K. Kadam, A.G.P. for respondents. CORAM : P.V. HARDAS AND N.D. DESHPANDE,JJ. DATE : 10th June, 2010 PER COURT : This is a petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India by which the petitioner has prayed for quashing and setting aside the provision of the Government Resolution dated 8th May, 2006 which excludes the holding of the auction of sand from private land. The petitioner also prays for issuance of a writ of mandamus directing the respondents to hold the auction proceedings for the purposes of excavation of the sand from the land belonging to private individuals. 2. In this petition none of the private individual land holders who are permitted to sell their sand without the Government holding the auction are made parties to the petition. Apart from that, the sand which is found 2 in the private lands of the individual land holders cannot be auctioned by the Government. The Government Resolution to that effect, therefore, excludes the holding of auction in respect of sand from private land. According to the petitioner, the petitioner is required to pay the auction price plus the royalty and the cost of the sand when sold in the open market is much higher than the cost of the sand which is sold by the individual land holders. There are two clear classifications in the Government Resolution. One class is of the persons who submit their bid in response to the auction notice for the purposes of excavation of the sand and the second class is of the individual land holders in whose land sand is accumulated by the natural process. In such circumstances, we do not find that there is any discrimination whatsoever in the Government in not directing the holding of the auction in respect of sale of sand from private land. 3. Petition is, therefore, devoid of any merit and, therefore, is summarily dismissed with no order as to costs. (N.D. DESHPANDE, J.) ( P.V.HARDAS, J.) amj/wp4695.10