HYDERABAD: The Telangana high court on Tuesday directed the government and Hyderabad Metropolitan Development Authority (HMDA) to furnish the allotment letter given by the state while transferring government land at Puppalguda in Rajendranagar to the HMDA in 2005.
Refusing to accept panchanama papers as a sole proof of transfer of land, the court gave six days’ time to furnish the letter.
The bench of Chief Justice Hima Kohli and Justice B Vijaysen Reddy gave this direction while hearing two appeals filed by the HMDA, challenging the survey of its land in survey number 452/1.
The land is worth around Rs 1,000 crore.
Additional advocate general J Ramachandra Rao said then government allotted 164 acres in survey number 452/1 to the HMDA in 2004.
However, at the instance of some private parties, the high court had ordered a survey of the land, he said.
“The survey was done without informing us.
Demarcation was also done in such a way that the private parties were eating into HMDA’s areas,” the state counsel said.
At this, the bench told the state counsel that panchanama was the final exercise that was done before handing over land to the HMDA.
“Prior to that, there would be a formal allotment or notification from the state government conveying its intent to transfer its land to the HMDA.
Show us those proceedings,” the bench said.
The additional AG said there was a panchanama conducted by the authorities concerned before handing over the land to the HMDA in 2004.
Irked by the repeated reliance on the panchanama by the state counsel, the bench asked counsel for HMDA, Y Rama Rao, to furnish some proof.
When he said a notification was issued under section 20 of the HMDA Act, the bench directed him to furnish such proof to the court by June 28.
The bench also directed the private parties to furnish to the court proof of their purchase from the vendors in 2005 and the rights their vendors had over the land from 1950 onwards.
The bench further sought to know from both the HMDA and the private parties the flow of title and the way it came to them.
The private parties — Kakatiya Enclaves Private Limited, Kakatiya Landscapes Private Ltd and a few others — claimed an extent of 11 acres in survey number 452/2 as theirs.
The state counsel said this was a non-existent survey number.
The single judge, in his October 2008 order, however, had recognised the existence of survey No.
452/2 and also the survey on 11 acres done in the presence of an advocate commissioner.
The HMDA is now claiming that the private parties have gobbled its land.