Rosaiah inaction: Rs 350-cr land lost

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Grossly compromising the interests of the state, former chief minister and current Governor of Tamil Nadu K. Rosaiah, took a decision when he was CM that compelled the government to forego ownership of 25 acres of prime land in the city worth Rs 350 crore.

Inquiries by this newspaper have revealed that the former chief minister reversed an earlier government decision to file a Special Leave Petition in the Supreme Court challenging the High Court judgement that went in favour of private parties who claimed ownership of 75 acres of land in Raydurg Panmaktha.

The High Court judgement of September 29, 2008, had upheld the state’s ownership of 50 acres of this land and awarded the remaining 25 acres to the private parties. The advocate-general had recommended in a letter (Lr No. 1213 of 2008) dated December 8, 2008, that the government file an SLP in the apex court. Nothing was done about it till February 15, 2010, when the government gave permission to the Ranga Reddy district collector to file the SLP.

Rosaiah failed to pull up RDO, collector
Giving the reason for the delays in filing the Special Leave Petition in the Supreme Court regarding the ownership of 25 acres of prime land in the city, former Ranga Reddy collector M. Dana Kishore said, “We asked the revenue divisional officer concerned to file the case in the Supreme Court.” He said this when asked about the reasons for the delay. Instead of pulling up the collector for delaying the filing of the Special Leave Petition, Mr Rosaiah noted in the file that since the Special Leave Petition was not filed so far, the government may as well drop the move to approach the Supreme Court.

Accordingly, the Rev-enue Department, thro-ugh its order (24886/Assn V/2010) of October 8, 2010, directed the district collector not to file the SLP. Interestingly, the advocate on record went ahead and filed the SLP on October 21, 2010, as the government’s decision to drop its legal battle was not communicated to him. The Supreme Court, however, refused to admit the SLP stating that the petition was time barred. The government should have approached the apex court within 90 days of the High Court’s judgement, but it took more than three years for it to do so.