- (1.)The petitioner-society, which is a society registered under the Madhya Pradesh Societies Ragistrikaran Adhiniyam, 1973, and claims to be running certain educational institutions in Ujjain, by merely filing an application on December 1, 2002 for allotment of the land for raising construction of building for an educational institution and by merely depositing the application money of Rs. 30,000/- has been able to prolong the present controversy with regard to declaration of surplus area of the ownership land of respondents No. 5 to 15, for an approximately a period of 5 years.
(2.)The facts relevant for adjudication of the controversy in question, may be noticed hereinafter. These facts have been assimilated from the pleadings of the parties and also from a report of the competent authority, which has been appended as Annexure R-6/A.
Smt. Anandi Bai, respondent No. 5 (since dead) widow of Chhogalal and her family members, were owners of 1.778 hectares of land at Kasba Ujjain. In view of the provisions of the Urban Land (Ceiling and Regulation) Act, 1976 (hereinafter referred to as the Act), a draft statement under Section 6 of the Act was filed by the land owners on April 21, 1980. Since it was proposed to declare the land owned by the land owners as surplus under the provisions of the Act, therefore, the said owners filed an application under Section 20 of the Act for exempting their land from being declared as surplus. Vide an order dated April 12, 1982, a final statement was ordered to be issued by the Competent Authority declaring 1.201 hectares of the land of the owners as surplus. Against the order of final statement, the land owners filed an appeal before the Appellate Authority. It was claimed by them that since in the application filed by them under Section 20 of the Act, an order had been passed to keep the surplus area proceedings pending till disposal of the exemption application, therefore, the final statement issued on April 12, 1982, was not justified and in fact was liable to be set-aside. However, it appears from the record that vide an order dated December 16, 1988, the appeal filed by the owners was dismissed and the order issuing final statement was upheld. After appellate order, the Competent Authority ordered issuance of the notification under Section 10(1) of the Act. At this stage, it may also be noticed that even at that point of time, proceedings in the application under Section 20 filed by the land owners were still pending and the interim order passed by the Competent Authority in the said proceedings was also operative.

(3.)Although, a notification under Section 10(1) of the Act was ordered to be published but it appears that no individual notice/notices had ever been issued to the land owners requiring them to file any objections.
The notification qua final statement under Section 10(1) of the Act was published on October 6, 1989. An order dated January 2, 1990 appears to have been passed by the Competent Authority noticing that no objections had been filed by the land owners. In these circumstances, it was ordered that notification under Section 10(3) of the Act be published. The said notification was published on March 9, 1990. Thereafter an order dated March 23, 1990 was passed by the Competent Authority directing issuance of the notices under Section 10(5) of the Act. The aforesaid notices appear to have been issued on March 24, 1990 and appear to have been received on March 31, 1990. Objections against the said notification were filed by the land owners on April 16, 1990. In the said objections, the land owners maintained that since the proceedings under Section 20 of the Act, for exempting the land, were still pending and a stay order was operating in the said proceedings, therefore, proceedings for declaration of surplus area and issuance of the notices under Section 10(5) of the Act, were wholly contrary to law and unjustified. The land owners also claimed that no notices had been received by them under Section 10(1) and 10(3) of the Act and therefore, all proceedings were vitiated. The aforesaid objections filed by the land owners, appear to have been dismissed by the Competent Authority on September 13, 1990. An appeal was filed by the land owners against the order dated September 13, 1990, which appears to have been allowed by the Additional Commissioner Ujjain vide order dated February 14, 1991. It is claimed by the land owners that in the order dated February 14, 1991, the Additional Commissioner had held that till the application under Section 20 of the Act was decided, no action under Section 10(1) or 10(3) of the Act should have been taken, more so, when the Competent Authority itself, vide order dated May 31, 1982, had ordered staying of the proceedings till the matter of exemption under Section 20 of the Act was decided. The Additional Commissioner finally directed that no possession could be taken till the application under Section 20 of the Act was decided.