New Shivane ‘encroachers’ get high court breather

Pune: A vacation bench of the Bombay high court on Thursday directed the Haveli tehsildar in the district to complete by June 10 a hearing process on the issue of eviction of “encroachers” from the Panshet flood-hit settlement at New Shivane.A group of 25 residents, among those facing eviction, had filed a writ petition seeking the court’s order to quash and set aside the notices of June 18, 2018 and April 20, 2023, and an eviction order of May 10, 2023 on the grounds that they had been residing at the settlement for the past 42 years and that the administration did not comply with the principles of natural justice by giving them a hearing before issuing the eviction order.The matter came up for hearing before the vacation bench of Justice Sharmila U Deshmukh and Justice Arif S Doctor. It took on record an affidavit-in-reply filed by Haveli tehsildar Kiran Magan Suravase. The court’s directive came after A P Vanarase, the counsel for Haveli tehsil administration, submitted that “in compliance of provisions under the Maharashtra Land Revenue Code, 1966, the petitioners would be given an opportunity of hearing and an appropriate order would be passed. Vanarase also submitted that till the fresh decision was taken by the tehsildar after hearing the petitioners, the impugned (under challenge) notices/orders would not be acted upon by the tehsildar. The order of May 10, 2023, would be treated as a show-cause notice to the petitioners.”Lawyer Ritvik Joshi, representing the petitioners, then submitted that a reply to the May 10, 2023 communication, which was to be now treated as a show-cause notice, would be filed within two weeks. Taking note of these submissions, the bench asked the tehsildar to give a hearing to the petitioners on June 5 and decide the matter on or before June 10.Joshi told TOI on Friday, “After the devastating Panshet flood in 1961, the state government had acquired a land at Shivane, a part of then Kothrud village, for the rehabilitation and resettlement of the flood-hit people. A total of 168 plots were demarcated on an 8-acre land, now known as New Shivane, for the flood-hit people.”It is the government’s case that some of these plots have been occupied by people not affected by the flood and they are encroachers of this land. “It is our case that the petitioners have been residing at the land since 1978 continuously for three generations without their possession getting disturbed. By virtue of occupying a government land for more than 30 years, they have now become owners by adverse possession,” Joshi said.
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