Scheme putting tenants at par with owners set aside

The Delhi high court has set aside a North MCD’s rehabilitation scheme under which tenants of demolished shops were put at par with the owners by giving both of them 50 per cent share in the relocated land.

Justice Indermeet Kaur said that converting a tenant’s status to that of a landlord is against all the statutes, dealing with such a relationship, and all the principles of equity, fairplay and natural justice.

The observations came as the court quashed a resolution of the north corporation by which it devised the rehabilitation scheme for providing alternative land to the owners and tenants of 121 shops at Azad Market in north Delhi.

The shops, which were leased out on a perpetual lease for 99 years, were demolished in 2009 for a road-widening project.

Only nine of the 121 shops were occupied by tenants and the owners of four such shops had challenged the rehabilitation scheme of 2014.

Allowing the plea of the owners, the court said, “By way of this resolution a man who was owning one complete piece of land had suddenly been reduced in his ownership to a status of 50 per cent. By the present resolution, the corporation has taken away all the rights of the petitioners.”

“The petitioners who were the owners... Have suddenly been reduced to a half ownership status. This resolution, if allowed to be implemented, would cause a grave prejudice.

It noted that the corporation had taken the same decision in 2009 when it had come out with a rehabilitation scheme subsequent to the demolition, but the high court had in 2012 set it aside and asked the civic body to consider it afresh.