Re: [mpisgmedia] metro property development (court up-date)

Hi Gita,
Keep up the good work :-)
BTW, for the benefit of mpisg, did you know that under RTI you can now find out the status of all those section 11A proceedings including minutes of meeting of Boards of Enquiry and Hearings, if any. Gita is barred from doing some of this since she is in Court (and apparently has other legal avenues to get the information), but others who are not in Court can do so.

Here is the relevant link (Gita assisted me greatly!! THANKS !!! to get this decisions in the Central Info Commission)

http://cic.gov.in/CIC-Orders/CIC_Order_Dtd_25022006.pdf

Some salient points of this decision are:-

1) Disproportionately diverting the limited resources of DDA is NOT a ground to deny information. ;-)

2) Information can be sought on ONGOING public activity - like formulation / modification of Master Plan of Delhi :-)

(This includes inspecting all public responses filed, minutes of meeting, samples, reports, etc. etc. submitted to Board of Enquiry)

3) Vice Chairman DDA is also in the RTI scope / ambit. YES !!!

Have Fun

Sarbajit

Gita Dewan Verma <mpisgplanner@xxxxxxxxx> wrote: Notice was issued on 28 Feb to Respondents (DMRC,
Delhi Govt, MoUD and DDA) in an application for
amending my writ petition to add paras, grounds and
prayer for quashing three notifications issued by MoUD
to modify the Master Plan to enable
metro-property-development at various sites in Delhi.

The petition was filed on 7 April 05 for directions
relating to disposal according to law of my duly filed
responses to three public notices issued since 2002
under s.11A of DD Act. I had not been heard on any of
them and on one of the sites (Shastri Park Metro Depot
on the riverbed) covered by all three, a commercial IT
Park had got not only built but also inaugurated by
bigwigs on 2 April 05.

The notifications were revealed in counter-affidavits
of August-September 05, with third (for IT Park) and
corrigendum to first (for metroPD at Shahdra-TisHazari
corridor stations, that had otherwise claimed no
objections / suggestions were received) issued after
the court had issued notice on 13 April 05. The
amendment application was filed last week, with
supplementary affidavit to bring on record start of
construction of IT Park Block-2 last month and RTI
replies received from DMRC and DDA this month that
failed to provide other information and informed me
that (only) IT Park is sub-judice (The last I found as
insulting as the petition-provoking
bigwigs-inauguration and turned to my wise and
indulgent counsel Murali and Gopal for yet another
impeccable translation of tantrum to civil procedure)

I am unaware of other matters in which only IT Park is
sub-judice. In my writ petition about s.11A violation
to enable metroPD, counter-affidavits have revealed
that IT Park is unauthorised construction without
building permit, DUAC and MoEF clearances and land use
change notification - all mandatory. I suspect all
other metroPD is likewise, but Respondents have not
been forthcoming with details of any other project
(Delhi Govt has not been forthcoming with even
counter-affidavit, though CM photos prettifying
metroPD news also prettify my annexures). Even in
response to my RTI Application for list of all metroPD
projects with names of associated architects /
planners, DMRC has named one project and its
architects and told me that IT Park Block 1 & 2 are
sub-judice. (Block-2 per se was not even mentioned in
pleadings in my writ petition till my affidavit of
last week and perhaps some PIL has been filed now).

Respondents had not filed counter-affidavits on notice
of 13.4.05 or further order of 23.5.05 granting their
request for more time, but after order of 27.7.05
restraining DMRC from finalising bids it had invited
for 15 year temporary-license for seemingly Disneyland
type temporary-constructions on 15 Ha of land it had
taken on riverbed in name of Depot. Yesterday (after
preliminaries of Gopal starting submissions about our
application about notifications-quashing, Lordship
asking Respondents for their view, Respondents
insisting the petition had become infructuous since
they had filed copies of notifications, Lordship
clarifying it had not) DMRC counsel wanted (only) the
stay on their recreation-amusement vacated.

He said the temporary green project was good for
preventing encroachment and was approved by LG and
they had bids and wanted to award work. (Obviously,
the Sultangarhi judgment of 16.9.2002 filed as
annexure in my petition has escaped their notice. In
that a DB headed by Chief Justice of the High Court
had scoffed at the encroachment-prevention benefit
claims offered on behalf of DDA by Arun Jaitley to not
only stop the mega-housing started without due process
of s.11A and environmental clearances but also to
direct same LG to inquire into how it started, to
prevent identical illegalities).

Lordship asked me to state my objections (our stay
application, to which DMRC counsel was referring, had
objected mainly on the grounds that they were issuing
tenders without having replied to notice issued by the
court). I said we had mentioned in Rejoinder that the
tender was in violation of the no-further-development
condition to which land use change for IT Park at
Depot site was subject as per the notification they
had filed later and that development is defined in DD
Act. DMRC counsel said they were only doing temporary
green for encroachment prevention and Lordship asked
me why I found that objectionable, given that
development is defined in the Act broadly. I said they
had not disclosed details of their temporary green and
their tender reserve price suggested it might not be
so. Lordship agreed they had not disclosed details and
asked DMRC counsel if they meant by Rides
merry-go-rounds with just grouting or Appu Ghar type
things with constructions. DMRC counsel was not sure
and Lordship asked me if I if I found merry-go-rounds
problematic. I said not if they are part of gardening
in metro depot but if they are part of commercial
development then that must conform to the Plan and the
proceeds must accrue to the Fund of the DDA under DD
Act, the core of my responses to all three Public
Notices. Lordship nodded and started dictating the
order.

Gopal said he wanted to make some submissions (we
wanted to mention Block-2). Lordship had just finished
saying Notice, etc, and ribbed us with
oh-you-do-not-want-notice and we said oh-we-do and
DMRC counsel said he wanted stay vacated. Lordship
told us all he was giving notice and short date and
added that DMRC counsel should bring relevant records
about details of their recreation-amusement and that I
be given also inspection of the same, for fixing which
my counsel will write to DMRC counsel.

We (especially Gopal) are wee-bit sad about not having
been able to fuss about IT Park Block-2, but delighted
with the order. We look forward to views on our
grounds for amending and to details of the
recreation-amusement they are so keen on.

I was also amused when Mr Mukul Rohtagi questioned the
other day, on behalf of Reliance in its petition
against Airports privatisation, competence of DMRC MD
Sreedharan. Mr Rohtagi had appeared for DMRC at first
two hearings in my petition and argued in the second
one that IT Park on riverbed is not on riverbed
because it is on dry land. That nugget is from a
letter from DMRC MD Sreedharan to CWC, subsequently
filed with DMRC counter-affidavit, strangely as
evidence of CWC clearance. (btw, the broad issues of
private development for transport infrastructure
finance are more comprehensively raised by metroPD as
an approach than by particular tenders for airport
privatisation or, for that matter, for
recreation-amusement with merry-go-rounds or other
Rides justified on basis of extraneous and purported
benefits like encroachment prevention. Perhaps the
question of competence of all-purpose idols is also
better scrutinised from perspective of approaches
rather than specific instances).

My writ petition is only for reliefs in respect of
s.11A violations. I was entitled to a proper hearing
by a duly constituted Board for Enquiry and Hearing
before the notifications were issued. I was denied
that hearing thrice on the same issue, despite having
sought it also through applications under s.41(3) to
MoUD, representations to President and CJI and Lok
Sabha Standing Committee and CVC and also to LG in
context of High Court orders for him in other matters.
In course of the petition I have expressed my
no-hearing grievance also in depositions before Lok
Sabha Standing Committee, Board for MPD-2021 and
Central Information Commission.

My concerns about metroPD, duly expressed since 2002,
are not themselves sub-judice. But the only two
occasions on which I have been heard on them were both
by way of unexpected querying by the court. On both
occasions I was heard after some men in black declared
my concerns to be without merit, for extraneous
purpose of urging stay-vacation for DMRC to be able to
proceed with a tender for their recreation-amusement.
On both occasions the plannerly pursuits I indulge in
for my recreation-amusement stood me in good stead.
What has I think been demonstrated, incidentally, in
my petition is that my concerns are not without merit.


My basic concern about metroPD is that far from being
a plan for land-based part-finance for metro, it is a
plan for subverting the DD Act plan for land-based
development finance for Delhi. It will siphon off the
prime-land pool and Fund of DDA, resources for city
development garnered over nearly half-century, for
unfettered use that can provide no more than
sub-optimal returns to DMRC (sub-optimality that will
ultimately reflect in high tariffs, etc) at
unaffordably high costs to the city.

I believe this is serious, but it cannot be my
grievance. I could be wrong and if I am right I am
still nobody to grieve if DDA creature of Act of
Parliament is happy to go bankrupt, if DMRC
joint-venture of Delhi and Central Govts is happy to
look like hand-maiden of global builder-mafia, if
cities emulating and those celebrating this model are
happy, and no one else is unhappy with all that. That
is the craftiness of purportedly participatory but
patently private-limited noise-making that passes for
development discourse: it has taken away my right to
understand or grieve as a planner and presumed to make
me look like its dumb whore. I am aggrieved by that
arrogance. So I had filed humble writ petition to be
heard strictly according to law and have now filed
amending application to turn the clock back so I can
be heard strictly according to law. I may have little
cause for hope in the comprehensively subverted
quasi-judicial processes for participation in
planning, but I have excellent reason to have no faith
at all in the extra-statutory discourse that has
subverted them.



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[mpisgmedia] metro property development (court up-date), Gita Dewan Verma
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