Legal notice served on LIT, MC

Kuldip Bhatia

Ludhiana, July 7

The Ludhiana Improvement Trust (LIT) has landed in a soup for failure to take action against illegal change of land use and subdivision of 22,814 square yards land allotted to the erstwhile New Senior Secondary School in the posh Sarabha Nagar locality here.

Going by conservative estimates, the land – allotted to the school management at a highly concessional rate in 1970 – presently commands a market value of more than Rs 1,000 crore.

A legal notice has been served on the LIT chairman, Commissioner of Municipal Corporation, president of the managing committee of (now defunct) New Senior Secondary School, managing committees of two other schools to whom part of the land has been allegedly leased out in an illegal manner, Joint Secretary (Affiliation), CBSE, New Delhi, and CMD of the Punjab State Power Corporation Limited by advocate Aditya Jain on behalf of BR Katna, a resident of Bhai Randhir Singh Nagar locality.

It has been alleged in the legal notice that the said site was allotted on concessional rates strictly for the purpose of setting up a primary school.

There was a clear embargo and prohibition in the allotment letter/agreement from making any additions and alterations without the written consent from the LIT and that only one building for the school could be constructed in the said property.

There was a clear prohibition to alienate or transfer the said property in any manner nor could the same be used for any other purpose except for which it was allotted.

“It has been observed that different schools and commercial establishments had started to come up on the school site by fragmenting the land allotted by the Trust. One school under the name of Kangaroo Kids School, an institute under the name and style of Orchid Institute, one senior secondary school under the name and style of Shri Ram Universal School and several other commercial establishments consisting of nine shops and godowns had started to come up on the said site. These establishments had started raising construction of their respective structures by partitioning and fragmenting the aforesaid site so as to pave way for multiple independent buildings to be constructed at this site,” says the notice.

It has been further alleged that the management of the allottee school had leased our parts of land to other schools on the basis of lease agreements, which were just a pretense and overground face of the “underground, dishonest and fraudulent transactions”.

The CBSE and PSPCL have also been made parties for granting affiliation to Shri Ram School on the basis of an allegedly unregistered and fraudulent lease deed and releasing multiple electricity connections to a single premises, in violation of the Electricity Act and Electricity Supply Code, respectively.

The legal notice has called upon the LIT and MC authorities for cancellation of allotment of land and demolition of illegal structures raised thereon while the PSPCL has been asked to immediately disconnect multiple electricity connections on the premises within 30 days of receipt of the notice.

“In case of non-compliance, my client shall be constrained to invoke the extra ordinary writ jurisdiction of the High Court under Article 226 of the Constitution of India for seeking the appropriate writs, orders and directions in this matter,” the notice added.

Allotted for setting up primary school

• It has been alleged in the legal notice that the said site was allotted on concessional rates strictly for the purpose of setting up a primary school.
• There was a clear embargo and prohibition in the allotment letter/agreement from making any additions and alterations without the written consent from the LIT and that only one building for the school could be constructed in the said property.