Gujarat HC issues contempt of court notice to Kutch collector

The Gujarat High Court today issued a contempt of court notice to the Kutch collector after he allegedly failed to comply with its earlier order in a case relating to allocation of pasture land at a village in the district.
A bench of the High Court comprising justices M R Shah and R D Kothari issued the notice to the Kutch collector and sought his presence on December 23, the next date of hearing.
The court was hearing a contempt of court plea filed by a Kutch-based Shabbir Ali Khalifa, who alleged that the collector did not allocate pasture land to Luni village in Mundra taluka despite the Chief Justice's order to do so.

In August this year, a High Court division bench headed by then Chief Justice Bhaskar Bhattacharya had ordered provision of pasture land to villages affected by industrial growth in connection with a public interest litigation (PIL), which had alleged that the district administration had not provided pasture land to many villages in Mundra taluka.
The Adani Group had filed an affidavit stating that 86 hectares of pasture land would be given back to the villages, after which the High Court had directed the Kutch collector to allocate pasture land to the villages within a month, Advocate Hashim Qureshi, who appeared for the petitioner, said.

However, the Kutch district collector did not provide pasture land to Luni village, Qureshi alleged on the basis of an RTI reply his client received from the district administration.
After hearing submissions, the High Court issued a contempt of court notice to the Kutch collector.