Hon'ble RAFIQ, J.— This writ petition filed by way of public interest litigation seeks to challenge the allotment of 300 acres of land by Jaipur Development Authority to the International Amusement & Infrastructure Pvt.Ltd., Noida (respondent No.5).

2. According to the petitioner, allotment of the aforesaid land to the respondent No.5 by Jaipur Development Authority (for short, the “JDA”) has been made in violation of Section 2 of the Forest Conservation Act, 1980 (for short, “FC Act”), Section 29 of the Wild Life (Protection) Act, 1972 (for short, “Wild Life Act”), Sections 54 and 90 of the Jaipur Development Authority Act, 1982 (for short, “JDA Act”), Sections 92, 93, 102A and 103 of Rajasthan Land Revenue Act, 1956 (for short, “Land Revenue Act”), Sections 26 and 33 of the Rajasthan Forest Act, 1953 (for short, “State Forest Act”), Section 5(28) of the Rajasthan Tenancy Act, 1955 (for short, “Tenancy Act”), Rule 7 of the Rajasthan Tenancy (Government) Rules, 1955 (for short “Rules of 1955”), Rule 15B of the Rajasthan Improvement Trust (Disposal of Urban Land) Rules, 1974 (for short, “Rules of 1974”) and Articles 14, 19, 48A and 51A of the Constitution of India. The petitioner contends that this land costs not less than Rs.600 crores, which has been allotted to respondent No.5 at a throw away price of Rs.48 crores. The petitioner has therefore approached this Court by filing the present writ petition challenging the letter of allotment dated 23/1/2008 as also the decision of the Board of Infrastructure Development & Investment Promotion (for short, “BIDI”) dated 10/8/2007 directing the JDA to make such allotment with an additional prayer that the letter dated 8/2/2008 handing over possession of the land in question to respondent No.5 be quashed and setaside and possession of the said land be restored to Forest Department of the State.

Background Facts :

3. The State Government by issuing notification under Section 2(8) of the JDA Act notified the area of “Jaipur Region” wherein, 153 revenue villages were included in the first instance. Village Daulatpura, which is where the disputed land is situate, was included at Sr.No.17 of the said notification. It is common ground between the parties that Delhi-Ajmer bye-pass, which connects the National Highway No.8 through outskirts of Jaipur City passes through the land in question. Respondent No.5 submitted an application to the Commissioner, Investment and NRI, Government of Rajasthan, Jaipur for allotment of 400 acres of the land for developing Mega Tourism City and then submitted a detailed application on 25/5/2006 spelling out its profile with other accomplished projects and overview of Mega Tourism City indicating that initial cost of this project would be approximately Rs.300 crores. The Commissioner, Bureau of Investment Promotion (for short “BIP”) vide his letter dated 6/6/2006 requested the Department of Urban Development & Housing, Government of Rajasthan to convey their views about the allotment. Separately, the Commissioner also wrote to the Secretary, Department of Forest vide letter dated 17/18.7.06 to send the views of his department on allotment of the said land. According to the respondents, a team of the State Government visited the site of another project of respondent No.5, which is located at Noida, on 4/10/2006. The matter was then considered by 15th Pre-BIDI and 39th State Level Empowered Committee (for short, “SLEC”) in a meeting chaired by the Chief Secretary of the State. J DA wrote to the Deputy Conservator of Forest (for short, “DCF”) a letter dated 27/11/2006 to enquire about the status of the land as the adjoining area was forest land and land in question was recorded as pasture land (charagah land) in the revenue records. Separately, Commissioner BIP wrote to the Commissioner JDA on 7/12/2006 to ascertain whether the land lies in the ecological zone and that the JDA should provide revenue maps to the Divisional Forest Officer (DFO) along with khas