Punjab and Haryana High Court: After news of demolition drive did some rounds across various media platforms, the Bench of G.S. Sandhawalia and Harpreet Kaur Jeewan, JJ. particularly cited ‘Times of India’ and ‘The Indian Express’ reporting demolitions being carried out in Nuh and Gurugram, took suo motu cognizance of the matter and ordered the State to stop any action of demolition being carried out without following the procedure as per law.
The Court expressed that the said reports stated that the individuals involved in anti-social activities that took place in various parts of Haryana had made illegal constructions, showing that the commercial buildings, residential buildings, restaurants, existing for a long time were brought down by bulldozers. It further reported that the Home Minister of Haryana Government himself said that bulldozers were part of illaj (treatment) for probing communal violence in Nuh and other districts.
The Court referred to Lord Acton’s words that “power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely” and issued notice against the State government using force and demolishing buildings on account of riots that occurred in Gurugram and Nuh. The Court particularly targeted the State’s action which was apparently carried on in the absence of any demolition orders and notices, allegedly by using the problem of law and order ‘as a ruse to bring down buildings without following the procedure established by law’. The Court was cautious of whether the buildings belonging to a particular community were being brought down under the guise of law-and-order problem, while the State conducted an exercise of ethnic cleansing.
The Court opined that “the Constitution of India protects the citizens of this country and no demolitions as such can be done without following the procedure prescribed in law.” Therefore, the Court issued directions to the State to furnish an affidavit stating the number of buildings demolished in the last two weeks in Nuh and Gurugram and information regarding issuance of notice before demolition, if any. The Court further ordered the State to stop if any such demolition was to be carried out if the legal procedure was not followed.
[Court on its own motion v. State of Haryana, 2023 SCC OnLine P&H 1095, Order dated 7-08-2023]
Advocates who appeared in this case :
Advocate General Baldev R. Mahajan, Additional Advocate General Deepak Sabharwal, Senior Deputy Advocate General Shruti Jain Goyal.
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Image Credits: The Hindu
