The court emphasized the necessity of protecting heritage structures from developmental impacts while allowing the petitioners to seek further legal remedies concerning any damage post-construction.

JUDGMENT :

(M.S. Sonak, J.)

1. Heard learned counsel for the parties.

2. The Petitioners are the Trustees of the Jamsetjee Nesserwanjee Petit Institute, a public charitable trust registered under the provisions of the Maharashtra Public Trust Act, 1950 and a society registered under the Societies Registration Act, 1860. The trust inter alia has founded and operates the J. N. Petit Reading Room and Library since 1856.

3. This petition concerns the building known as the “J. N. Petit Institute,” along with an arcade constructed on the land bearing C.S. No. 702 of Fort Division, in the Neo-Gothic Revival style, dated 1898. This structure features various ornamental, decorative, and distinctive elements, including a circular staircase tower, bouquets, finials, and tower turrets that shape its silhouette. The petitioners have stated that this building has an extremely shallow foundation, only around three metres deep, and extends beyond the superstructure of the building. It is acknowledged that this building is a Grade II A Heritage Structure and is regarded as one of the landmark properties along D.N. Road, Fort, Mumbai.

4. The Petitioners have pleaded that the said building was renovated in 2014-15 and was conferred the UNESCO Award of Distinction for Cultural Heritage Conservation in 2015.

5. The Petitioners have pleaded that the building has always been and is still used as a Reading Room and library, housing 1,00,000 books, including 2,400 rare books and 12 manuscripts, some of which date back to the 17th Century. The library also houses three collections of newspapers, viz. Jam-e-Jamshed from 1936 onwards, Times of India from 1933 onwards and Mumbai Samachar from 1926 onwards. The Petitioners have pleaded that the building is open to all subscribers to the Library/Reading Room, including the poor and needy citizens, at reasonable and affordable subscription rates. Several poor and needy students use the Library and Reading Room for their studies.

6. Metro Line III was proposed to be aligned along the D. N. Road, Fort. Several objections were raised from various quarters to this alignment, mainly because it would seriously affect the structures or stability of the several heritage structures on either side of this road. Even the Mumbai Heritage Conservation Committee (MHCC) objected to this alignment and withheld its No Objection Certificate (NOC) for some time. The MHCC, later, upon being assured that only the tunnelling method would be adopted and that no station, namely the Hutatma Chowk Station, would be constructed at D.N. Road, or that such a station would be built using the cut and cover method, reluctantly agreed to the Metro Line III alignment along D.N. Road.

7. Before the construction work could commence, the contractors engaged by the Mumbai Metro Rail Corporation Ltd. (MMRCL) sought the Petitioners’ NOC to allow them to enter the Petitioners’ property to carry out a pre-construction survey, to install building monitoring instruments and allow their representatives to read such monitoring instruments. The Petitioners were also requested to furnish structural/as-built drawings of the said building.

8. By letter dated 22 February 2017, the Petitioners sought som