Le Meridien commercial tower occupants seek quashing of eviction notice

Several occupants of the commercial tower of luxury hotel Le Meridien today sought quashing of an NDMC eviction notice before the Delhi High Court, saying they were not informed about the reasons.
The counsel for the occupants argued before Justice Rekha Palii that the New Delhi Municipal Council (NDMC) has not told them their fault and it was mala fide on their part.
"They issued a notice on January 10 without giving the grounds for eviction. The case has not been put to me by the NDMC," senior advocate Amit Sibal, appearing for some of the occupants, said.
Rajan Kapoor, one of the sub licensees, has filed a writ petition in the court seeking to quash the NDMC's January 10 notice which had asked the occupants to stop using the premises at the commercial tower for any purpose and said that they were liable to be removed with immediate effect.

The NDMC had granted seven days time to vacate the premises.
While there were 98 occupants of the tower, only some of them approached the high court. The then Additional Solicitor General Sanjay Jain, appearing for NDMC, had assured the court that no action would be taken against them till pendency of the petition.
The notice signed by an NDMC official had stated, "The occupants are therefore liable to be stopped from using the premises at the commercial tower for any purpose and are further liable to be removed from the above premises with immediate effect, for which purpose, I, with the approval of the competent authority, hereby direct you to vacate the premises within seven working days, failing which the premises will be dealt with in accordance with the law All such sub licenses or any other arrangements with CJ International (hotel) are per se illegal having no sanction from NDMC.

The high court fixed the matter for hearing on March 22, when the counsel for some other occupants will advance the submissions.