‘Arbitrary’: SC quashes preferential land allotment policy for ‘privileged’

New Delhi: In a significant judgment, the Supreme Court on Monday quashed the government orders facilitating preferential land allotments to MPs, MLAs, bureaucrats, judges and journalists within the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation limits, saying the distribution of state largesse was “capricious” and “irrational”.

A bench comprising Chief Justice Sanjiv Khanna and Justice Dipankar Datta held the policy to be “unreasonable, arbitrary, discriminatory”, and violative of Article 14 (right to equality) of the Constitution.

“The allocation of land at basic rates to select privileged groups reflects a ‘capricious’ and ‘irrational’ approach. This is a classic case of executive action steeped in arbitrariness, but clothed in the guise of legitimacy, by stating that the ostensible purpose of the policy was to allot land to ‘deserving sections of society’,” the verdict said.

Shorn of pretence, this policy of the state government, is an abuse of power meant to cater exclusively to the affluent sections of the society, disapproving and rejecting the equal right to allotment of the common citizen and the socio-economically disadvantaged, it added. “It would not be wrong to say that the doctrine of manifest arbitrariness, as expounded in Shayara Bano v. Union of India is applicable,” the judgement said.

Writing a 64-page judgment for the bench, the CJI ruled in favor of public interest, emphasising the policy perpetuated inequality and undermined the principles of substantive equality enshrined in the Constitution.

“When the government allocates land at discounted rates to the privileged few, it engenders a system of inequality, conferring upon them a material advantage that remains inaccessible to the common citizen. This preferential treatment conveys the message that certain individuals are entitled to more, not due to the necessities of their public office or the public good, but simply because of their status,” it said.

Referring to the policy, it said the higher echelons of all the three wings of the government -- legislators, bureaucrats, and judges of the Supreme Court and High Courts -- were afforded such preferential

treatment.