HC stays Lok Adalat award on 90-acre Kapra land, seeks counters

Hyderabad: Telangana high court on Thursday stayed the implementation of a Lok Adalat award concerning a 90-acre land dispute in Medchal Malkajgiri district and directed private parties claiming ownership to file their counters.The land at Kapra, now valued at hundreds of crores, was notified as displaced persons' land in 1966. However, private individuals later approached the settlement officer seeking cancellation of this status. In 2019, the private parties secured a Lok Adalat award without making the state govt a party and subsequently moved a lower court for its implementation. Challenging the lower court's order, the state govt approached the high court. The matter came up before a division bench comprising Justices Moushumi Bhattacharya and Gadi Praveen Kumar. Govt counsel Katram Muralidhar Reddy submitted that the land had long been under dispute and was classified as displaced persons' land in 1966. He pointed out that the Supreme Court had declared it as govt land in 2011. Despite this, the private parties remained inactive until 2019, when they pursued a compromise and obtained a Lok Adalat award. He further argued that the lower court ordered implementation of the award without examining the background of the case and without the govt's knowledge. The order was subsequently challenged in 2023. Counsel for the private parties contended that the matter had already undergone multiple rounds of litigation and that the present petition was not maintainable. After hearing both sides, the bench granted an interim stay on the lower court's direction, asked the private parties to file their responses and posted the matter for further hearing on June 15.