HC upholds cancellation of Rajarhat land allotment

The Calcutta High Court has upheld the cancellation of allotment of land at Rajarhat New Town on eastern periphery of the city to 61 petitioners by HIDCO, observing that the entire process of allotment under the Chairman's quota was a "sham."
Justice Sanjib Banerjee rejected petitions challenging the cancellation of allotment of land made to these petitioners at the fag end of the previous Left Front rule.
Justice Banerjee observed that there were several "discrepancies" in the applications and minutes of the meetings that led to the allotment of the plots in February, 2011.
The Housing Infrastructure Development Corporation (HIDCO) plans and executes development projects in the entire 6,000-7,000 hectare area in Rajarhat New Town.

He noted that as to the rejected allottees of residential plots, several of the applications refer to 'New Town Police Station' or to 'Jyoti Basu Nagar' years before such police station was set up or New Town was sought to be renamed.
"Many of the residential applications that fall for consideration are also either undated or carry hand-written dates or are in a similar form," Justice Banerjee said in his order passed yesterday.

"It is unnatural that so many anomalies appear in the applications for allotment of plots. The only logical inference is that the process was undertaken on the basis of extraneous considerations and the related documents have been fabricated or manufactured to try and window-dress the process as authentic," he noted.

"The facts lead to the inescapable inference that the entire process of approving or granting allotment of plots under the Chairman's discretionary quota was a sham and that the exercise of discretion was arbitrary, at variance with the guidelines set therefor and otherwise opposed to public interest and contrary to public policy.
"The functioning of the company during the relevant point of time appears to have been on the writ of its minister-chairman," Justice Banerjee observed.