Protik Prakash Banerjee, J. - (1.) It'S a pity if a statutory authority who has 60 days to take a certain step, allows that time to elapse, becomes functus officio, and then, when the consequence has already ensued, attempt to take that step. In ordinary life, we say he is trying to shut the stable after the horse has bolted. If the writ petitioner had made out this short case which is apparent from the face of the records then this writ petition would not have haunted the cause list for the last 7 years.
(2.) Admittedly the writ petitioner owns land within the RajpurSonarpur Municipality. He wanted to erect a building on such land. For this he applied for sanction of a building plan to the Board of Councilors of the Rajpur-Sonarpur Municipality. The application was made on December 12, 2011 and was received by the Board of Councillors, admittedly on December 13, 2011. The duty of the Board of Councilors in such a case is provided for under Section 207 of the West Bengal Municipal Act, 1993. Such provision is set out hereinbelow: - Section 207: Sanction of building plan and permission to execute work: - Within sixty days after the receipt of any application with building plan or of any information or document which the Board of Councillors may reasonably require the applicant to furnish before deciding whether sanction shall be accorded in this regard, the1[Board of Councillors] shall, by written order,-- (a) either accord sanction to the building plan conditionally or unconditionally and give permission to execute the work, or (b) refuse, on one or more of the grounds mentioned in section 210, to accord such sanction, or (c) accord sanction but impose conditions for compliance before permission to execute the work. (2) A building plan sanctioned under this section shall remain valid for three years from the date of such sanction, and may be renewed for such period, and on payment of such fee, as may be prescribed.]
(3.) The Board of Councillors allegedly did not respond nor ask for any clarification or information from the petitioner even though more 60 days expired. Since the said period of sixty days expired the Board of Councillors or anyone purporting to represent it, naturally became functus officio in terms of the above provision of Section 207 and lose any jurisdiction to do anything about it. This becomes clearer when one considers the scheme of the statute particularly Section 208 thereof. Section 207 provides as follows: - "Section 208 - Sanction to be deemed to have been granted if the Board of Councillors defaults in according sanction: If, within the period referred to in section 207, the Board of Councillors has neither accorded nor refused to accord sanction to a building plan, nor granted permission to execute a work,1[the applicant may appeal to the Municipality, in writing, in this regard, and if the appeal as aforesaid is not disposed of within 30 days from the date of the appeal, such sanction or permission shall be deemed to have been granted; and the applicant may proceed to execute the work; so, however, that nothing in this section shall be deemed to have permitted the applicant to contravene any of the provisions of this Act or of the rules made under section 198 or of any rules or regulations applying to such work".;