HC stays Haryana govt order to stop construction work
CHANDIGARH The Punjab and Haryana high court on Tuesday stayed Haryana government’s order whereby it had asked the Rajiv Gandhi Charitable Trust to stop construction work of an eye hospital in Gurugram.
The order was passed by the vacation bench of justice Anita Chaudhary and justice HS Madaan while issuing notice to the state government for July 13. The trust, chaired by Congress president Sonia Gandhi, got five acres and three marlas of Ulhawas panchayat land in 2010 on a lease for 33 years to set up a charitable eye hospital.
It was stipulated that the eye hospital will be constructed within two years of the lease period. However, the trust could not construct the hospital within this period and got two extensions when the Congress was in power in Haryana.
In Tuesday’s petition, the trust has challenged the June 8 letter of the Gurugram district town planner (enforcement), whereby the trust’s occupation certificate was rejected and it was asked to stop construction work. The district town planner had stated that the trust had failed to put the leased land to use within two years.
The trust had argued before court that the June 8 letter was shot off even as another application for occupation certificate was pending with the town and country planning department, which was “ignored” and “even otherwise the validity of the building plans was still in force”.
On January 3, Gurugram senior town planner had rejected the trust’s application seeking occupation certificate reasoning that the hospital’s construction work was incomplete.
As per the June 8 letter, CLU permission was granted to the trust on May 6, 2011, which was valid up to 5 May 2013. The CLU was extended for till May 5, 2014 on 26 April, 2014 and again on July 17, 2014, it was further extended till May 5, 2015.
The trust had to complete the construction and also to procure the occupation certificate by May 5, 2015. However, neither the construction is complete nor was the occupation certificate procured, the letter states. The Ulhawas land leased to the trust has been embroiled in controversies over the grant of change of land use permission during the Congress rule with the BJP, then in the opposition, alleging favouritism.