IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Civil Writ Petition No. 21418 of 2010 Date of decision: 23.03.2011 Sukhdev Singh and another .....Petitioners VERSUS State of Haryana and others ....Respondents CORAM:- HON'BLE MR.JUSTICE RANJIT SINGH Present: Mr. Anmol Rattan Sidhu, Senior Advocate with Mr. Vinay Arora, Advocate for the petitioners. Ms. Shruti Jain, AAG, Haryana for the State. **** RANJIT SINGH, J. On 09.07.2003, the auction of the land measuring 55 kanal 16 marla was held. The petitioners participated in the auction and were successful with highest bid of Rs. 12,04,100/-. The petitioners then deposited Rs. 3,01,025/- on the spot on 09.07.2003 being 25% of the bid amount. The auction was to be confirmed within 30 days. The petitioners were handed over the possession of the land. The petitioners claim to have got this land levelled and made it cultivable. As per the petitioners, they spent sum of Rs. 70 lakhs for this purpose. It may be noticed that the land, which was auctioned to the petitioners, was a brick kiln. Deputy Commissioner, Fatehabad initiated move for seeking approval for the auction. The petitioners instead received a Civil Writ Petition No. 21418 of 2010 -2- letter for refund of auction money as the auction was rejected by the competent authority on the ground that this was conducted by Naib Tehsildar, who was not the competent authority to do so. The petitioners filed the writ petition before this Court. This writ petition, however, was got dismissed as withdrawn to file civil suit. On 28.10.2006, the petitioners filed the civil suit which was dismissed on 16.04.2009. The appeal filed against the same was also dismissed on 26.11.2009. Thereafter, the petitioners filed Regular Second Appeal before this Court which was also dismissed on 26.02.2010. Review application which was filed in this case was also dismissed on 27.04.2010. The petitioners then filed Special Leave Petition against this order, which was dismissed on 09.07.2010. The petitioners then served a notice to deposit an amount of Rs. 2,67,498/- on account of the rent alongwith the interest for occupying the Government land. The petitioners filed this writ petition to challenge this order. Counsel for the respondents on the basis of reply filed would point out that only show cause notice has been issued by the Collector and no recovery as such has been ordered. It is pointed out that the occupation charges have been calculated as per the market rate, which is more than 5½ lakhs. The respondents would, thus, submit that after adjusting sum of Rs. 3,01,025/- payable to the petitioners, an amount of Rs. 2,67,498/- still is due towards the petitioners for use and occupation charges. Accordingly, it is prayed that writ be dismissed. Civil Writ Petition No. 21418 of 2010 -3- No doubt the civil suit filed by the petitioners was dismissed but direction was issued by the civil Court to refund the amount deposited by the petitioner at the time of auction. The petitioners, thus, can rightly ask for refund of this amount. Claim for interest may not need any observation as no interest was awarded by civil courts. Fairly, the respondents cannot link the payment of this amount with any recovery which is yet to be finalised. It will not be appropriate to issue such direction in the present writ petition. However, direction need to be issued to the respondents to refund the amount of Rs. 3,01,025/-. Let that be done with a period of one month from the date of receipt of copy of this order. The petitioners may claim interest on this amount if they consider themselves legally entitled to it by initiating any appropriate proceedings. The proceedings in progress against the petitioners for recovery of occupation charges may continue and if any adverse order is passed against the petitioners, they would be at liberty to take any appropriate action in accordance with law. March 23, 2011 (RANJIT SINGH ) rts JUDGE