THE HON'BLE SRI JUSTICE B.PRAKASH RAO And THE HON'BLE SRI JUSTICE SANJAY KUMAR 12th August 2009 WRIT APPEAL NO.1828 of 2002 Between: 1. N.Chenchaiah, S/o. late Subbaiah, 53 years, Business, Resident of Vijayawada, Krishna District. And two others. …APPELLANTS AND The Municipal Corporation of Vijayawada, rep.by its Commissioner. …RESPONDENT THE HON'BLE SRI JUSTICE B.PRAKASH RAO And THE HON'BLE SRI JUSTICE SANJAY KUMAR WRIT APPEAL NO.1828 of 2002 JUDGMENT: (Per the Hon’ble Sri Justice Sanjay Kumar) This appeal arises out of the order dated 08.08.2002 in Writ petition No.12609 of 1999. The appellants herein were unsuccessful before the learned Single Judge in making out a case for refund of the amount paid by them to the Municipal Corporation, Vijayawada, the respondent herein, towards betterment and drainage charges. The admitted facts of the case are that the appellants entered into an agreement with one Bharathi Co-operative Building Society Ltd., for construction of apartments. In furtherance of this agreement, the appellants paid betterment and drainage charges to the respondent-Corporation, whereupon the respondent-Corporation released the Building Plan on 28.05.1992. However, as the agreement between the appellants and the Building Society did not fructify, the construction of the apartments was not undertaken. Accordingly, they sought refund of the betterment and drainage charges paid by them before the learned Single Judge. The learned Single Judge, taking note of the scheme of the Hyderabad Municipal Corporation Act, 1955, which is applicable to Vijayawada City, found that there was no provision therein providing for refund of betterment and drainage charges paid to the Corporation. Further, the learned counsel appearing for the Corporation submitted before the learned Judge that the amounts paid by the appellants had already been utilized for providing amenities such as roads and drainage facilities in the area in which the apartment building was proposed to be constructed. In such circumstances, the failure on the part of the appellants to construct the apartments does not result in any entitlement to seek refund of the betterment and drainage charges paid by them; all the more so, when there is no provision in the statute permitting such refund. The learned counsel appearing for the appellants sought to place reliance upon the judgment of a Division Bench of this Court in Sham Apartments and others v. The Commissioner (Now Special officer), Municipal Corporation of Hyderabad [1]. However, upon perusing the said judgment, we find that the same has no application to the facts of the present case. The said judgment dealt with the imposition of a condition precedent with regard to payment of drainage and betterment charges prior to the grant of the building permission, which was found to be invalid by this Court. Such is not the situation before us in the present case. In the totality of the circumstances, we find no reason to interfere with the order passed by the learned Single Judge. The Writ Appeal is devoid of merits and is accordingly dismissed. No costs. _________________ (B.PRAKASH RAO, J) _________________ (SANJAY KUMAR, J) 12th August 2009 RRB [1] ALT 1983 (2) Vol.XLVIII Page 1