Prior court direction to treat application under KLU Order Clause 6 binding despite subsequent statutory amendments.

JUDGMENT :

HARISANKAR V. MENON, J.

The petitioner has approached this Court seeking to challenge Ext.P20 order issued by the 1^st respondent herein. The issue arising for consideration in this writ petition has a chequered history. Certain properties were held by one Sri.N.P.Venugopalan and others, which, in the revenue records were described as paddy fields. The afore Sri.Venugopalan and others sought to obtain a building permit for construction of a residential complex. But the local authority refused the afore request, essentially pointing out that the property in question is described as “paddy field” in the documents. Sri.Venugopalan and others filed W.P.(C) No.28071 of 2013 before this Court. By Ext.P6 judgment dated 27.11.2013, this Court ultimately found that the rejection of the building permit application was unsustainable and the nature of the property, at present, requires to be analysed. On that basis, the application for building permit was directed to be reconsidered, on the basis of which, it is the admitted case that the building permit was issued in the name of Sri.Venugopalan and others. It is at that juncture that the petitioner Company came into the picture. The petitioner sought to purchase certain extent of property originally held by Sri.Venugopalan and others. By Ext.P1 sale deed dated 29.01.2014, an extent of 1.25¼ Acres of property in Re.Sy. No.37/1 of Puzhathi Village was purchased by the petitioner. Out of this, the petitioner states that certain extent was sold to a sister concern and it is only the balance extent which is being retained by the petitioner. The petitioner also obtained a building permit at Ext.P7 dated 16.12.2014, with reference to the property covered by Exts.P1 and P2, and subsequently when the building permit at Ext.P7 was to expire during December, 2016, the petitioner sought for extension of the building permit. The petitioner also states that, it has obtained the No Objection Certificate from the Fire and Rescue Services as well as Consent to Establish from the Kerala State Pollution Control Board. In the meantime, the Village Authorities issued the stop memo at Ext.P11 dated 22.07.2015, essentially pointing out that the activities carried on by the petitioner requires to be stopped since the property is a paddy land. The Panchayat has also issued a stop memo, which, however, was revoked pursuant to Ext.P12 dated 02.06.2015, with reference to the stand taken by the petitioner on the basis of the afore documents. To be on the safer side, the petitioner states that it submitted Ext.P16 application under the provisions of the Kerala Conservation of Paddy Land and Wet Land (Regularization of Unauthorised Reclamation) Rules, 2015 and Section 3A of the Kerala Conservation of Paddy Land and Wetland Act, 2008 (hereinafter referred to as ‘the Act’), dated 11.02.2016. However, the provisions of of the Act came to be abrogated on 23.11.2016. In such circumstances, the petitioner had approached this Court by filing W.P.(C) Nos.8050 of 2016 and 2087 of 2017, which came to be disposed of pursuant to Ext.P17 judgment dated 22.09.2020. This Court specifically took note of the contention raised by the petitioner that, when of the Act has been abrogated, an application in the nature of the one at Ext.P16 requires to be considered as one presented under the provisions of the Kerala Land Utilization (KLU) Order, 1967 – under Clause 6(2). On that basis, this Court issued the following directions;

“In the light of above, these writ petitions are disposed of with the following directions:-

i) The District Collector is directed to take up Ext.P13 produced in WP(C) No.8050/2016 under Clause 6 of the Kerala Land Utilization Order after issuing notice to the