HC Setback to AAI on Disputed Property in Hyderabad

Hyderabad: A two-judge panel of the Telangana High Court, comprising Chief Justice Alok Aradhe and Justice N.V. Shravan Kumar, rejected a batch of writ appeals filed by the estate officer and APD, Airports Authority of India (AAI). The appellant was before the bench, aggrieved by an order of a single judge who had quashed orders issued by the authority under the Public Premises (Eviction of Unauthorised Occupations) Act, 1971. The appellant was ordered to remove flats in Archana Apartments. The aggrieved persons moved the High Court claiming title over the property, on which they had constructed the flats after obtaining loans from banks. It was the case of the AAI that that the building was constructed by encroaching upon its land to an extent of 570 square yards. As such, it had directed the petitioner/respondent to remove the flats. There were civil suits between the original owner and the AAI; when the latter lost its case, it could not have issued the impugned notice under the Act. A single judge on a detailed consideration of the facts of the case allowed the writ petitions, aggrieved by which the AAI embarked unsuccessfully in the present batch of appeals. Senior counsel E. Madan Mohan Rao argued that the single judge had come to the wrong conclusion that there was a bona fide dispute of title and the issue was to be adjudicated in civil courts, whereas it was a dispute of survey/boundary/identification of the property in respect of the land bearing Survey No. 15 held by AAI, which could be resolved by the authority concerned under Act 40 of 1971. Rejecting the plea of the appellant, the panel, speaking through Justice Shravan Kumar, said that the airport authorities ought to have taken steps when the construction was in progress on the disputed site. However, they issued the impugned proceedings in the writ petition belatedly and that too after the construction was completed. Rejecting the appeals, the panel would not place reliance on the AAI survey conducted without issuing notice to the affected parties. “The core issue involved in these appeals, which falls for consideration, is the very identification of the disputed property and clear demarcation of boundary, which is only possible by way of proper survey and thereby rights of the parties would be determined. In view of the same, the parties are left open to pursue their remedies as available under law,” the panel concluded.