IMPORTANT POINTS:
If there is a Town Planning Scheme prevailing for an area, it will have supremacy over the Master Plan existing for the area

JUDGMENT :

SHAJI P. CHALY, J.

1. This appeal is preferred by the third respondent in the writ petition i.e. the District Town Planner, Thrissur challenging the judgment of the learned Single Judge in W.P. (C) No. 15852 of 2019 dated 23.09.2019, whereby it was partly allowed, and held as follows at paragraphs 4 to 6:

“4. When I consider the afore submissions, it is obvious that Secretary of the Thrissur Corporation is now incapacitated, on account of the old DTP Scheme, which reserves the area in question as the “lorry terminal in allowing the application for permit made by the petitioner.” Even if it is accepted that the old DTP is now antiquated and obsolescent and therefore, that Exts.P11 and P12 judgments have been delivered by this Court directing the Corporation to consider the permits even for construction in the said area, I do not deem it prudent to direct the grant of permit to the petitioner disregarding it going by the judgment of a Division Bench of this Court in The District Town Planner, Kottayam and Another vs. Antony Joseph and Others, W.A. No. 109/2015.

5. However, since, it is now conceded before me that a new Master Plan is being prepared for the Thrissur Corporation area, I deem it appropriate to accede to the suggestion made by its learned Standing Counsel and to direct the competent Authority of the Thrissur Corporation to reconsider the petitioners application, adverting to the new Master Plan to be published, within a period of four months from the date of receipt of a copy of this judgment.

6. I am fixing the afore period so as to enable the Thrissur Corporation to be in possession of the new Master Plan and so that the petitioner's application can be considered in terms of it provisions rather than that of the old DTP Scheme. If, however, for any reason, the new Master Plan is not published within the time that I granted in this judgment, then the Secretary of the Corporation will reconsider the petitioner's application as has been done in the case of the petitioner's in Exts.P11 and 12 judgments and issue appropriate orders thereon.”

2. The basic material facts projected by the writ petitioners/respondents 1 and 2 in the writ petition were as follows:

Writ petitioners together own a parcel of land comprising 14 cents in Survey No. 927/5 of Chembukavu Village, Thrissur Taluk, Thrissur District within the limits of the Thrissur Municipal Corporation, the first respondent in the writ petition. According to the writ petitioners, it is a pucca dry land situated in the midst of commercial buildings and as per Ext.P2 judgment in L.A.A. No. 1138 of 1998 dated 05.06.2002, it was held by a Division Bench of this Court that the said property is a commercially valuable property, which was confirmed by the Apex Court as per Ext.P3 order in Civil Appeal No. 6161 of 2002 dated 22.04.2009. The case of the writ petitioners was that an application for building permit submitted earlier by the writ petitioners were rejected stating that the description of the property was ‘paddy field’ in the village records and that there was a proposal to acquire the land for the establishment of a lorry terminal. The said order was quashed by this Court as per Ext.P7 judgment dated 13.03.2018 and the Revenue Divisional Officer, Thrissur was directed to re-consider the building permit application, in the event of the writ petitioners obtaining permission under the Kerala Land Utilisation Order, 1967 for utilization of the property for other purposes other than the paddy cultivation. It is also undisputed that the petitioners have secured necessary orders certifying that the property in question was not included in the data bank prepared under the provisions of the Kerala Conservation of Paddy Land and Wetland Act, 2008. But, in spite of production of the order from the Revenue Divisional Officer, the building permit application submitted by the writ petitioners was rejected by the Thrissur Municipal Corporation as per Ext P10 order stating t