Delhi Municipal Corporation Act, 1957 – Deemed sanction of plan for construction of a residential house – Grant of – Respondent decided to dismantle 85 years old house which was in a dilapidated condition and put up a new construction to be utilised for their residence – Submission of plans before the Municipal Corporation, however, no decision taken – Application filed before the tribunal, and deemed sanction of the plans granted – Thereafter, concurrent findings by the courts below – Interference:
Held: No good ground to interfere with the impugned judgment by the High Court – Single Judge very correctly held that the owners cannot be compelled to convert the ground floor of their residential accommodation to a commercial unit, rather, he may choose to do so – Appellant cannot expect the respondents to put up construction in a manner by which the ground portion would be for commercial use, and the upper floor would be for residential purpose, and more particularly, when he has a vested crystalised legal right to use it for residential purpose for all times to come – Submission on behalf of the appellant defies logic that the respondents may continue to reside in the dilapidated house, but if they want to put up new construction, then it has to be commercial on the ground floor and upper floor as residence – Even the notification, does not support the case put forward by the appellant in any manner – With 15 years having passed by, they will have to incur huge expenditure for putting up new construction – Photographs of the subject house of the respondents show that it is in a dilapidated condition and any time may collapse – In fact, the appellant should have expressed concern about the safety and lives of the occupants of this house, rather than objecting to sanctioning of their plans – This is nothing short of harassment – Respondents to put forward fresh plans for approval for construction of a house – Considering the arbitrary and high-handed manner in which the appellant harassed the respondents, cost of Rupees ten lakh to be paid to the respondents by the appellant. [Paras 11, 13-20]
As published in the Supreme Court Reports, Supreme Court of India. Headnotes prepared by: Nidhi Jain. Text from the Indian Supreme Court Judgments open data set (Dattam Labs), CC BY 4.0.
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