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Hyderabad:
In a landmark judgment, the Andhra Pradesh High Court Tuesday
ruled that 1,654 acres of prime land allotted to several
multinational companies on the outskirts of Hyderabad is Wakf
land.
A division bench of the high court dismissed a batch of writ
petitions and civil revision petitions by Lanco Hills Technology
Park and others and upheld the state Wakf Board's contention that
the land at Manikonda village estimated to be worth Rs.32,000
crore belonged to it.
The bench comprising Justice V.V.S. Rao and Justice R. Kanta Rao
declared that 1,654.79 acre land belonged to Dargah Hazrat Hussain
Shah Wali, a Wakf institution and not to the government. It ruled
that once a land is declared Wakf land it remained so forever and
its nature or character can't be changed.
Lanco Hills owned by Congress MP L. Rajagopal and others including
Microsoft, Infosys, Wipro, Polaris and Emaar Properties, in their
writ petition had challenged the injunction orders issued by the
Wakf Tribunal last year not to alienate the land or take up any
construction activity on it.
Masood Khan, standing counsel of the Wakf Board, told IANS that
the court also dismissed the contention of the beneficiaries that
the board has no right to issue errata notification. Under this
notification, the board had declared the land a Wakf property.
The land to the MNCs was allotted by then government of N.
Chandrababu Naidu through Andhra Pradesh Industrial Infrastructure
Corporation (APIIC). Dubai-based realty major Emaar Properties was
allotted 400 acres for an integrated township and golf course.
According to the Wakf Board officials, software giant Microsoft
got 54.79 acres, Infosys 50 acres, Wipro 30 acres, Polaris 7.89
acres, and Lanco Hills 108.10 acres.
Except Lanco Hills, all others have completed the constructions on
the land. Lanco Hills, which was allotted the land by Y.S.
Rajasekhara Reddy government, is building $1.5 billion mega
project comprising residential area, IT towers in the Special
Economic Zone, retail and hospitality.
The ownership dispute between the Lanco and others and the Wakf
Board was on since 2007. The government had also defended its
allotment to MNCs on the ground that it was government land as the
land was acquired after payment of commutation to the custodian of
the property. The court, however, upheld the Wakf Board contention
that a
property once declared Wakf vests with the Almighty.
"We hail the high court order. It has upheld our contention," Wakf
Board chairman Syed Ghulam Afzal Biyabani alias Khusro Pasha told
IANS.
"It is a landmark judgment with far-reaching consequences. This
will act as a deterrent against illegal allotments of Wakf land by
the government," said Masood Ahmed.
"From the next time the officials will be cautious while allotting
Wakf lands in the name of APIIC or some other camouflage," he
added.
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