Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Feb 25: A Bench of Supreme Court comprising Justice M M Sundresh and Justice SVN Bhatti has rejected the Roshni claim of an encroacher Mohd Ramzan Bhat and directed him to pay actual market value of the land as was prevailing in the year 2019 and interest up to date.
The direction was passed in SLP filed by J&K UT Government against verdict of Division Bench of J&K High Court in a case pertaining to land of Amigos Restaurant in Gogji Bagh area of Srinagar.
The Division Bench had directed the UT Government to execute documents of ownership in favour of the encroacher at the rate prevailing on date of original regularization in the year 1978, which was meager Rs 95,000 for prime land.
It was argued by Rushab Aggarwal, Standing Counsel for the UT that the judgment of the High Court failed to appreciate that the petitioner was a serial land grabber and also failed to take into account that the petitioner had himself claimed inability to originally pay the demand.
“Therefore now he cannot take benefit of the 1978 rates. Doing so would mean giving away valuable state land at throwaway rates”, he added.
Agreeing with the submissions of the Standing Counsel, the Supreme Court Bench comprising Justice MM Sundresh and Justice SVN Bhatti rejected the Roshni claim of the encroacher Mohd Ramzan Bhat on the 7 Marlas of land and for the other 6 Marlas of land with the direction to him to pay actual market value of land as prevailing in the year 2019 with interest up to date.
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