The High Court of Uttarakhand has quashed the provision of the state government's 2009 Nazul policy according to which such land was made freehold in the favour of encroachers. Finding this policy provision to be unconstitutional and illegal, the high court has also imposed a penalty of Rs5,00,000 on the state government. This penalty will be deposited in the account of the national law university.
According to the case details, former ward member of Rudrapur, Ram Babu and high court advocate Ravi Joshi had filed a PIl in the high court challenging the Government's Nazul policy of March 2009. The petitioners stated that the government had made Nazul land freehold for a nominal token amount from those who had illegally encroached on such land which is unconstitutional and illegal.
It was also stated that the supreme court in the past had made provision for the use of Nazul land. Despite this, instead of making public use of the Nazul land, the government was using the land in favour of illegal encroachers and some special persons while the poor persons in need of such land were being ignored.
Hearing the case, the division bench of justice Rajiv Sharma and justice lokpal Singh observed that democracy functions according to the rule of law while the policy of the State Government contradicts the rule of law. Nazul land should be used for public welfare and for needy citizens including BPl category, scheduled caste, scheduled tribes and OBC.
In its order, the high court has court had quashed conversion of Nazul land into freehold as part of which about 1900 acres of such land is located under the purview of the Rudrapur municipal corporation alone.