- (1.) A solitary tree standing in one corner of an industrial plot measuring 3000 sq. meters in Sector-29, Part-II, Panipat has been used as a decoy and an excuse not to start construction of building within a period of one year from the issue of final letter of allotment/offer of possession in terms of Clause 17 of the Allotment Letter dated 10.02.2004 (P-1) after seeking approval of building plans. The industrial unit on such plot was required to go into production after constructing minimum 25% of the permissible covered area of the plot within a period of three years reckoned from offer of possession. Failure to do so would be visited with resumption and forfeiture of money paid in whole or in part. This was the mandate of Clause 17. Clause 7 of the Allotment Letter recited that possession of the site will be offered on completion of development works in the area. In the present petition, it has neither been pleaded nor suggested nor complained of that the development works of the area were not complete sufficient to obstruct construction. The only excuse that remained was to whip up the pretext of the tree standing on the plot. It is pleaded in the petition on the one hand that there were 'trees' standing which needed to be cut so that the possession on the spot could be delivered to the parties while on the other, in paragraph 5, the plurality of "trees" was restricted to 'a tree' and it is stated that "thus, cutting of a tree to give the site to the person would clearly be included in the expression development. The respondents themselves have not developed the land and as such are not in a position to give the possession even till date as they have not removed the tree on the site."
(2.) Regulation 13 of the Haryana Urban Development (Disposal of Land & Buildings) Regulations, 1978 deals with delivery of possession and reads as under:- "13. Delivery of possession. The possession of the land shall be delivered to the transferee or lessee as soon as the development works in the area where the land is situated are completed: Provided that in the case of sale/lease of undeveloped land/building, possession thereof shall be delivered within 90 days of the date of allotment."
(3.) Development has been defined in Section 2(g) of the Haryana Urban Development Authority Act, 1977 (hereinafter referred to as "the Act") which reads as follows:- "2(g) "Development" with its grammatical variations means the carrying out of building, engineering, mining or other operations in, on, over or under land or the making of any material change, in any building or land and includes re-development.";