Madras High Court bans conversion of agricultural land into layouts
The bench directed the IG Registration to circulate the order to all registering authorities forthwith and adjourned the matter.
Chennai: The Madras High court has directed the authorities not to give approval or permission to convert agricultural lands into layouts and prevented the IG Registration from registering the unapproved land and buildings.
The first bench of Chief Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul and Justice R. Mahadevan, before which a petition filed by Elephant G Rajendran, came up for hearing, said
“we are of the view that this aspect would brook no delay till the government develops some thought process for plans and brings into force Section 22A of Registration (Tamil Nadu Amendment) Act 2008”.
The bench said we thus hereby direct that no registering authority shall register any sale deed in respect of any building constructed on such plots unauthorised layouts.
The bench said this order becomes necessary in order to prevent unauthorised and haphazard development/sale of agricultural areas for agricultural use, and giving government time to come with a broad policy document to save ecology and prevent flooding.
The judges said, “We are concerned with the absence of any provision for the Act/Rules/Regulations at present describing any wetland lying for more than three years to be converted into residential or other use applied for. This was noticed in our order dated March 24, 2016 while simultaneously noticing that only 5 per cent of land area was under statutory planning process and for the remaining 95 per cent plans are yet to be developed”.
The bench said “We are of the view that this aspect would brook no delay till the government develops some thought process for plans and brings into force Section 22A of Registration (Tamil Nadu Amendment) Act 2008”.
“We thus hereby direct that no registering authority shall register any sale deed in respect of any building constructed on such plots or unauthorised layouts. This order becomes necessary in order to prevent unauthorised and haphazard development/sale of agricultural areas for agricultural use, and giving government time to come forthwith with a broad policy document to save ecology and prevent flooding”, the judges said.
The bench directed the IG Registration to circulate the order to all registering authorities forthwith and adjourned the matter to October 21.