New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Tuesday directed the Prayagraj Development Authority (PDA) to pay Rs 10 lakh compensation to a man and others whose residential buildings were “inhumanly and illegally” demolished in 2021 without due process.
A bench, comprising Justices Abhay S Oka and Ujjal Bhuyan, observed that the actions of the PDA were a blatant violation of Article 21 of the Constitution, which guarantees the right to life and shelter.
“These cases shock our conscience,” the bench remarked, slamming the authority’s “highhanded” approach.
The court found that the PDA issued a show-cause notice under Section 27 of the Uttar Pradesh Urban Planning and Development Act on December 18, 2020, and allegedly attempted to serve it the same day.
A demolition order was passed on January 8, 2021, and the structures were razed just a day after a registered post communication was received by the appellants on March 6, 2021.
The court ruled that the process was fundamentally flawed, pointing out that no genuine effort was made to personally serve the demolition notice. Instead, the PDA affixed the notices and failed to wait the minimum 15-day window required to allow the owners to appeal the order.
“The officers of the PDA must understand that before a structure is demolished, every possible effort should be made to ensure proper and effective service of the show-cause notice,” the bench said. “This is one more case of bulldozer justice… the rule of law must prevail,” the Court said.
The Supreme Court also criticised the Allahabad High Court’s March 8, 2021 order for refusing to interfere in the demolition and set it aside.
The bench directed the PDA to strictly follow the legal safeguards established in the 2024 In Re: Demolition Directions case and allowed the petitioners to file separate proceedings to reclaim their land rights and seek further compensation.
Although the apex court offered the option of rebuilding the homes with an undertaking to remove them if the appeal fails, the appellants expressed their inability to do so.
Consequently, the court imposed Rs 10 lakh in costs on the PDA for its arbitrary and unlawful action.
The appellants’ counsel had also argued that their properties were wrongly linked to slain gangster-politician Atiq Ahmed, who was killed in April 2023, and claimed the state had misused its authority under this pretext.
UNI
