IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE, ANDHRA PRADESH AT HYDERABAD (Special Original Jurisdiction) MONDAY, THE TENTH DAY OF NOVEMBER TWO THOUSAND AND EIGHT PRESENT THE HON'BLE MR JUSTICE B.SESHASAYANA REDDY WRIT PETITION NO : 5242 of 2008 Between: B.Srinivas, S/o. Late Surya Rao R/o. 1-37-20, Balamrai, Secunderabad. ..... PETITIONER AND 1 Secunderabad Contonment Board, Rep. by its Executive Officer Secunderabad. 2 D.Anitha D/o. Sri Durga Prasad, R/o. 3-7-80, Kakaguda Village, Thirumalgerry, Secunderabad. .....RESPONDENTS Petition under Article 226 of the constitution of India praying that in the circumstances stated in the Aﬃdavit ﬁled herein the High Court will be pleased to issue a writ of Mandamus or any other appropriate writ order or direction declaring the action of the ﬁrst respondent in attempting to demolish the Godown of the Petitioner in Premises bearing No.1-37-20, Sy. No. 28, Balamrai, Secunderabad, without issuing Notice as illegal, arbitrary, contrary to Sec. 248 of Cantonment Act 2006 and without jurisdiction and pass Counsel for the Petitioner:MR.K.SURESH REDDY Counsel for the Respondent No.: . The Court made the following : THE HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE B. SESHASAYANAREDDY Writ Petition No. 5242 of 2008 Order: This writ petition has been ﬁled by Sri B. Srinivas assailing the action of the Secunderabad Cantonment Board, represented by its Executive Oﬃcer, the ﬁrst respondent, in attempting to demolish his godown bearing premises No.1-37- 20, in Survey No.28, Balamrai, Secunderabad, without issuing notice under Section 248 of the Cantonment Act, 2006 (for short ‘the Act’). 2. The petitioner claims to be a tenant of the premises bearing No.1-37-20 owned by D. Anitha, the second respondent. According to the petitioner, he has been carrying out empty bottles business and the entire godown is ﬁlled up with empty bottles stock worth lakhs of rupees. It is the version of the petitioner that if the constructions are required to be demolished, a notice under Section 248 of the Act is to be served on him and there being no service of notice under the said provision, the action of the ﬁrst respondent in contemplating to demolish the premises is illegal and improper. 3. Notice before admission came to be ordered on 11.03.2008 while directing the parties to maintain status quo. The ﬁrst respondent ﬁled counter along with vacate stay petition in WVMP No. 2094 of 2008. One Sri Muneer T. Khambati ﬁled WPMP No. 9642 of 2008 seeking his impleadment in the writ petition as party respondent. The said implead petition came to be ordered on 23.06.2008 and consequently Muneer T. Khambati came on record as respondent No.3. Respondent No.3 ﬁled WVMP No.1850 of 2008 with a prayer to vacate the interim order. 4. When the vacate stay petitions came up for consideration, with the consent of the parties, the writ petition is taken up for final disposal. 5. Heard learned counsel appearing for the petitioner, learned Standing Counsel appearing for the ﬁrst respondent- Secunderabad Cantonment Board, Sri D. Raghu, learned counsel appearing for respondent No.2 and Sri V. Srinivas, learned counsel appearing for respondent No.3. 6. Learned counsel appearing for the petitioner submits that the petitioner is the lessee in respect of the premises bearing No.1-37-20, and therefore, he is required to be put on notice as contemplated under Section 248 of the Act. Learned counsel appearing for the third respondent submits that the second respondent herein approached this Court by ﬁling W.P. No.12824 of 2007 assailing the action of the ﬁrst respondent and ultimately the writ petition ﬁled by her came to be disposed of to invoke a statutory remedy of appeal. For better appreciation I may refer para 15 of the order passed in the said writ petition, which reads as hereunder: “In the light of several factual controversies and also the speciﬁc stand taken that it is out of the knowledge of the 1st respondent that the petitioner has been in possession of this property and despite the same, in the light of the directions made by this Court, the 1st respondent while considering the representations had taken a decision to further proceed with the demolition activity and also in the light of the speciﬁc stand that in fact several attempts had been made to serve notice on Vijaya Lakshmi and for reasons best known it appears the said Vijaya Lakshmi had avoided the receipt of notice and the same had been pasted at the premises and also in the light of the speciﬁc stand taken by the 1st respondent, this Court is of the considered opinion that these factual issues may be eﬀectively gone into in an Appeal. Further, prima facie, no doubt, on the respective stands taken by the parties, the petitioner is unable to substantiate her title to the property and no acceptable material had been placed before this Court in this regard. Hence, in the light of the respective stands taken by the parties, let the writ petitioner invoke the appeal remedy in accordance with law and to enable the writ petitioner to invoke such appeal remedy and to obtain such appropriate orders, the interim order granted by this Court to be operative for a period of two weeks.” 7. The petitioner herein is aggrieved by the notice said to have been issued by the ﬁrst respondent in exercise of powers under Section 248 of the Act. There is statutory remedy available to the aggrieved party under Section 340 of the Act. Therefore, the petitioner has to avail the statutory remedy available under the Act. Reserving the liberty to the petitioner to avail the statutory remedy available under the Act, the writ petition is disposed of. The status quo order, passed by this Court on 11.03.2008, shall remain in operation for a period of two weeks from today. No costs. __________________________ B. SESHASAYANAREDDY, J. Date: 10.11.2008 Note: Issue CC in two days (B/O) Nsr