2007 Supreme(SC) 11

2007(1) Supreme 8
SUPREME COURT OF INDIA
(From Bombay High Court)
Dr. AR. Lakshmanan and Altamas Kabir, JJ.
State of Maharashtra—Appellant
versus
Public Concern for Governance Trust & Ors.—Respondents
Civil Appeal No. 14 of 2007
(Arising out of SLP (C) No. 18965 of 2006)
With
Civil Appeal No. 15 of 2007
(Arising out of SLP (C) No. 2707 of 2006)
Decided on 4-1-2007
Counsel for the Parties :
For the Appellant : F.S. Nariman, R.F. Nariman, Mukul Rohtagi, Sr. Advocates, P.H. Parekh, E.R. Kumar, Sameer Parekh, Ranjeeta Rohatgi, Nitin Thukral, Sumit Goel (for M/s. P.H. Parekh & Co.), Parimal K. Shroff, Ms. Bina Gupta, Ms. Inklee Barooah, Ms. Amrita Swarup, V.N. Raghupathy, Siddhartha Chowdhury, Advocates and Vinay Mohan Lal, Appellant-In-person(in C.A. No. 15/2007).
For the Respondents : G.E. Vahanvati, Solicitor General of India, Ravi Kadam, Advocate General for State of Maharashtra, Chander Uday Singh, Altaf Ahamed, Sr. Advocates, S.S. Shinde, R.P. Wadhwani, Varun Thakur, Sanjay Dubey, A.S. Bhasme, Vinay Navare and Naresh Kumar, Advocates.

IMPORTANT POINT
In a case of allotment of land for urban development, when the allegations have been made against the Chief Minister of the State without making him party in the case, condemnation of the Chief Minister without affording him opportunity of being heard is a complete negation of the basic principles of natural justice.

Headnote:Maharashtra Regional and Town Planning Act, 1966—Procedure for allotment of land—City and Industrial Development Corporation (CIDCO) is an authority constituted for development of Navi Mumbai as a township—Detailed regulations and procedures for allotment of land by CIDCO to various entities—Applications made by respondents 5 to 10 to CIDCO—All business of Urban Development Department was under the control of the Minister for Urban Development—The then Chief Minister noted on those applications the words ‘please put up’ and then applications were forwarded to the new town development authority i.e. CIDCO for further processing—CIDCO made allotments of land to the six cooperative housing societies—Public Interest Litigations filed challenging the allotments—High Court set aside allotments on its own conclusions and interpretation of file notations—Observations made against the then Chief Minister which according to the State of Maharashtra were unwarranted—Appeal filed only for the limited purpose of expunging certain remarks made by the High Court against the then Chief Minister who was not even a party to the case—High Court did not give an opportunity to the affected party, the then Chief Minister before making remarks—Nature of remarks made in the judgment will cast a serious aspersion on the Chief Minister affecting his reputation, career etc.—Condemnation of the Chief Minister without affording opportunity of being heard was a complete negation of basic principles of natural justice—Remarks/observations/strictures made are expunged.

       Held that the strictures/observations/remarks made by the High Court against the then Chief Minister Shri Sushil Kumar Shinde is not warranted in the facts and circumstances of this case as according to us the High Court has erred in making observations as regards notations made in files which observations are made on their own reading and interpretation of the files without any further reference to the petitions or the then Chief Minister who was not even a party to the case and without even calling for an explanation in that regard. The High Court has failed to notice that the Chief Minister was heading the Urban Development Department and CIDCO comes under the administrative control of the urban development and since the applications for allotment of land were received by the Chief Minister, who merely made a notation that the application be put up before the concerned authority. The High Court also erred in observing that the application made by respondent No. 10 had been received by the Chief Minister and bore his endorsement on 05.04.2005 to the effect please process and pass by 12.04.2004. We have perused the said document. The above endorsement is not written by the Chief Minister and in fact the said application did not even reach the office of the Chief Minister at any point of time.(Para 22)

       In the instant case, allegations have been made against the then Chief Minister, however, he was not made party before the Court. Therefore, the allegations made against him are one-sided and do not merit any consideration. We are surprised to find that inspite of catena of decisions of this Court, the High Court did not, give an opportunity to the affected party, the then Chief Minister, before making remarks. It cannot be gainsaid that the nature of remarks made in this judgment will cast a serious aspersion on the Chief Minister affecting his reputation, career etc. Condemnation of the then Chief Minister without affording opportunity of being heard was a complete negation of the basic principles of natural justice. For the foregoing reasons, we have no hesitation in expunging the remarks/observations/strictures made against the then Chief Minister of Maharashtra - Shri Sushil Kumar Shinde and allow the appeal filed by the State of Maharashtra who, in our opinion, is competent to maintain this appeal and order expunction of the remarks and observations/strictures made against the then Chief Minister. The appeal stands allowed only to the above extent.(Paras 24 to 26)