Delhi HC pulls up Centre for inaction on Sainik Farm regularisation | Latest News Delhi
New Delhi
The Delhi high court on Wednesday pulled up the Union government for its failure to indicate a timeline to formulate a policy for regularising south Delhi’s Sainik Farm colony. It proposed passing an order directing all authorities in the Capital to redress grievances faced by residents by making a collective decision.
A bench of chief justice DK Upadhyay and justice Tushar Rao Gedela expressed displeasure after the Union housing and urban ministry’s counsel Rakesh Kumar failed to come up with a policy decision—with regard to a previous order, on February 6—and submitted that the Union government, by way of its notification in 2019, had decided not to regularise 69 affluent colonies, including Sainik Farm and those built on forest land.
On February 6, the court had asked the Centre’s counsel to seek instructions regarding the time within which it would formulate a policy to regularise the colony and reprimanded the government for its “delay” in taking a call.
“What are you doing? You’re neither taking any action for demolition or regularising them. You are not doing anything– Humme na karna pade, court kar de kuch (We need not do something and the court will pass an order). You keep on arguing. You need to do something,” the bench said to Kumar.
It added, “This can’t be permitted to go on and on and on. What will happen? This is not the solution. On the last day, we had asked him (Centre’s counsel) to come up with the policy decision and thus you have not. There has to be a lot of thinking. Even the state government and DDA as well, you sit together and make a decision. What we propose is that the Government of India, Delhi government, DDA and the residents should sit together and find a solution.”
In the course of the hearing, the court emphasised the struggles residents were facing due to the delay. “Unnecessarily (due to) these litigations, they (residents) are living in some kind of fear. Kal kon JE aayega, parso kon aayega, they don’t know (residents do not know as to which junior engineer will come tomorrow or the day after),” the court said.
The court fixed for April 16 the plea filed by Ramesh Dugar, convener of the area development committee of Sainik Farm and Defence Services Enclave Residents Welfare Association, seeking regularisation of the colony and permission to carry out repairs in the construction. The court also urged additional solicitor general Chetan Sharma and Delhi government counsel Sameer Vashisht to assist it.
In his petition in 2015, Dugar asserted that although the Centre and the Delhi government had implemented a policy for the regularisation of unauthorised colonies, a discriminatory approach was allegedly being adopted when it came to the Sainik Farm area.
In April 2022, the court asked the Centre and the Delhi government to resolve the issue, saying that the current state of affairs was leading to the perpetuation of gross illegality. However, in May 2022, the Delhi government filed an affidavit through standing counsel Sameer Vashisht stating that it had no role in the process of regularisation of the unauthorised colonies in the Capital and that the entire process was being carried out by the DDA, in terms of the notification issued by the Government of India in October 2019.
In May 2023, the court asked the Centre to expedite the decision on regularisation and evolve a mechanism for residents to carry out repairs and minor alterations etc. in the existing structures, taking a dim view regarding the pendency of the petition since 2015. The court had also raised questions regarding categorising the colonies as affluent and non-affluent to consider their regularisation.
