Jolt to Jamuna Hatcheries

HYDERABAD: In a jolt to former minister Etala Rajendar’s family in the land row at Achampet village, the Telangana High Court on Thursday dismissed an interim application filed by E. Jamuna, one of the directors of Jamuna Hatcheries and wife of Rajendar.

The plea was to restrain the revenue and survey authorities from conducting a survey of the lands and prevent any further action on the survey notices issued by the deputy inspector of survey in Toopran division of Medak district.

Considering the lockdown constraints and the pandemic situation, the court directed the local tahsildar to fix another date for the survey in the second or third week of June.

The court of Justice B. Vijaysen Reddy was dealing with the petition. Earlier, the petitioner and other partners in Jamuna Hatcheries had approached the High Court complaining that the revenue authorities had conducted the survey without following the procedure and rushed into their lands to threaten them in an unlawful manner.

At that time, the court directed the revenue authorities to follow the procedure and rules of revenue acts while entering into the lands of the petitioners for the survey.

Based on the directions of the court, the deputy inspector of survey issued the notices on May 6 to the occupants of the lands in the various disputed survey numbers. However, Rajendar’s wife filed a fresh petition seeking to restrain the conduct of survey.

The petition was brought before Justice Vijaysen Reddy on Thursday by Advocate General B.S. Prasad. He submitted that the intention of the petitioner was to delay the process of survey and inquiry into the illegal occupation of the said lands.

Counsel for the petitioner defended the case by citing technical points that a survey of the land can be conducted only when the occupants of the said survey number have made an application for a survey to fix the boundaries. In this case, no one made such an application and hence the procedure is a violation of the rules of the Survey and Boundaries Act 1923, he submitted.

Reacting to this, Justice Vijaysen Reddy asked petitioner Jamuna as to what prejudice would be caused to her if the survey is conducted in the subjected lands – which, according to the government, are assigned lands under illegal encroachment and occupation of private persons.

Justice Reddy also said that the petitioner can approach the court if the resumption orders was passed against their land or if any adverse order was issued. He reminded the petitioner about the earlier court order, which directed the authorities to follow the procedure while doing the survey. How can the court stop the survey when due procedure followed, he asked.

Another petition filed P Krishna Reddy, agriculturist hailing from Devarayamjal village in Shamirpet mandal, sought a court order to the endowments and revenue officials not to dispossess the petitioner from his land admeasuring seven acres and three guntas in the village in Medchal Malkajgiri district.

Justice Vijaysen Reddy asked the commissioner of the endowments department and the district collector of Medchal not to demolish sheds existing on the land and not evict the tenants from this land.