New Delhi: For 84 years, the Maharashtra Police department occupied two flats in south Mumbai without any written order or lease deed. The owners had a harrowing experience freeing the flats from the clutches of the police department, which even stopped paying rent for the past 18 years. They, however, remained undeterred and finally won the legal battle in the Supreme Court earlier this month.
A bench comprising justices J B Pardiwala and R. Mahadevan said: “We are happy that we have been able to do justice with the appellants (Neha Chandrakant Shroff and Dev Jayvaden Ghia) who have been frantically trying to get back their property (two flats) in question, which the state occupied way back in 1940 without any written order requisitioning the two flats for temporary use by the police authorities or any lease deed in writing”.
The apex court made it clear that injustice, whenever and wherever it takes place, should be struck down as an anathema to the rule of law and the provisions of the Constitution. The bench, in a judgment delivered on April 8, said the high court should have considered that the flats were occupied since 1940 when the country was under British rule and fighting hard for its independence.
The bench further said, the department perhaps might have persuaded the appellants or their predecessors in title to part with the possession of the two flats for the police department. “However, it has been now 84 years that the police department has been in occupation and use of the two flats. Look at the conduct of the department. We are informed that for the past eighteen years even rent has not been paid”, said the bench.
The bench observed that to ask the appellants to file a suit and recover the possession would be like adding insult to the injury. “At this point of time, if the appellants are asked to institute a suit, we wonder how many years it would take by the time the litigation would come to an end if at all it reaches up to the highest court of the country”, said the bench. The apex court said the constitutional powers vested in the high court or the Supreme Court cannot be fettered by any alternative remedy available to the party concerned.
“We direct Nitin Pawar, the Deputy Commissioner of Police, who is personally present in the court to file an undertaking on oath stating that the department shall hand over vacant and peaceful possession of the two flats in question definitely to the appellants within a period of four months from today”, said the bench.
The appellants had moved the apex court against the Bombay High Court's April 30, 2024 order, rejecting their writ petition for release of two flats.
According to the police, there were two families of police officers residing in the two flats in question. “In fact, it has come to our notice today for the first time that the flats in question are not being utilised as an Office of the Police Department but two families are in fact residing here. The monthly rent of each flat measuring 600 square feet situated in South Bombay is Rs 700 per month”, noted the apex court.
The petitioners in the high court had contended that in or around 1940, the two flats were permitted to be temporarily occupied by the police department at their request so as to meet the requirement of housing police officers to enable maintenance of the law and order situation. The petitioners have pleaded that there was no written contract executed between their predecessor and the police department.
Certain amounts were paid by the police department to the predecessor on a monthly basis and Rs 611 per month was paid till December 31, 2007. On September 10, 1997, the predecessor of the petitioners, through his advocate, had issued a communication to the respondents raising a grievance with regard to non-payment of the monthly amount.
“According to the petitioners, since they were in need of the aforesaid premises, a request was made to the respondents to return possession of the same. Since the same was not done, this writ petition came to be filed”, the high court noted in its order.
The additional government pleader had submitted before the high court that in absence of any written order of requisition, it was not open for the petitioners to contend that the respondents had requisitioned the two flats in the year 1940.
“On the contrary, it was submitted that possession of the same was handed over voluntarily and monthly amounts were being paid to the predecessor of the petitioners, which was evident from the record. According to him, the grievance made in the writ petition was also with regard to non-payment of the monthly amounts, which would thus indicate that the petitioners were seeking eviction of the respondents without terminating their license/tenancy”, the high court had noted.
