The discretion of the sanctioning authority under the MRTP Act must be upheld, and not every objection must be accepted. Public participation in the planning process is essential, and individual concerns must yield to the greater public need in civil engineering and civic planning for a large command area.

JUDGMENT :

GS Patel, J.

1. Rule. By consent, Rule is made returnable forthwith.

2. The principal objection in this Petition is to the refusal of the State Government to accept the proposed modification to a Development Plan (“DP”) and, instead, in exercise of its discretion as the sanctioning authority under the Maharashtra Regional Town Planning Act, 1966 (“the MRTP Act”), to revert the land to the purpose for which it was originally sanctioned or reserved initially.

3. The land in question is Gat No 432/4 admeasuring 87 Ares in the jurisdiction of the Sangli Miraj and Kupwad Municipal Corporation (“the SMKMC”).

4. The 1st Respondent is the State Government through its Urban Development Department. The 2nd Respondent is the Municipal Corporation. The 3rd Respondent is the Chhatrapati Shahu Institute of Business Education And Research Trust, Kolhapur. The 4th Respondent is the Joint Director, Town Planning, Pune Division.

5. On 7th September 2000, the Municipal Corporation made a declaration following its Resolution No 78 of 20th July 2000. That declaration was under Section 23(1) of the MRTP Act of the Municipal Corporation’s intention to prepare a Development Plan (“DP”) for the recently formed SMKMC. The process of preparation of a DP is time-consuming: there are several stages at which an official notification or publication is mandated, followed by a period during which suggestions and objections are allowed to be submitted, then there is to be hearing, following which all objections are to be considered, and then a final report is made. There may or may not be modifications and there are provisions in the Act, as we shall presently see, of the procedure to be followed (including re-publication, fresh suggestions and objections, etc) where a modification is of a substantial nature.

6. While we have dealt with some of these aspects in our recent judgment in Rational Art & Press Private Limited v State of Maharashtra through the Principal Secretary and Ors, 2023 SCC OnLine Bom 2272 : Neutral Citation: 2023:BHC-OS:12183-DB. it will be fruitful to quickly survey the relevant portions of the statute.

7. Section 2 contains definitions and, of these, definitions of ‘amenity’ in Section 2(2), ‘development’ in Section 2(7), ‘development plan’ Section 2(9) and ‘planning authority’ in Section 2(19) are important. They read:

(2) “amenity” means roads, streets, open spaces, parks, recreational grounds, play grounds, sports complex, parade grounds, gardens, markets, parking lots, primary and secondary schools and colleges and polytechnics, clinics, dispensaries and hospitals, water supply, electricity supply, street lighting, sewerage, drainage, public works and includes other utilities, services and conveniences.

(7) “development” with its grammatical variations means the carrying out of buldings, engineering, mining or other operations in or over or under, land or the making of any material change, in any building or land or in the use of any building or land or any material or structural change in any heritage building or its precinct and includes demolition of any existing building, structure or erection or part of such building, structure of erection; and reclamation, redevelopment and lay-out and sub-division of any land; and “ to develop” shall be construed accordingly.

(9) “Development Plan” means a plan for the development or re-development of the area within the jurisdiction of a Planning Authority and includes revision of a development plan and proposals of a special planning Authority for development of land within its jurisdictions;

(19) “Planning Authority” means a local authority; and shall includes,—

(a) a Special Planning Authority constituted or appointed or deemed to have been appointed under section 40; and

(b) in respect of the slum rehabilitation area declared under section 3C of the Maharashtra Slum Areas (Improvement, Cle