L&DO seals news agency's office hours after HC rejects its plea against eviction

New Delhi: News agency UNI's office in central Delhi was sealed hours after Delhi High Court on Friday dismissed its plea against an eviction order issued by the land and development office (L&DO), which is under the Union ministry of housing and urban affairs (MoHUA).

In its 98-page order, the court noted that for 45 years the news agency failed to fulfil the only condition under which land at No.

9, Rafi Marg, New Delhi, was allotted to it. "Indeed, the facts of the present case reveal a situation where valuable public land has effectively been held hostage by a licensee who has failed to perform its obligations for decades," Justice Sachin Datta said. "Such conduct strikes at the very foundation of the allotment framework governing public land. The cancellation of the allotment was, therefore, fully justified and legally inevitable," the judge said.

In court, UNI blamed govt agencies for delay in granting it permission to construct an office, and claimed it asked co-owner, Press Council of India , to construct it, but it didn't do so. It also told the court that after undergoing the corporate insolvency resolution process, the successful resolution plan by The Statesman Ltd was accepted by NCLT.

The court also took a dim view of the delay by the land-owning agency in taking action. "The L&DO/Ministry of Urban Development is also directed to ensure that conditional allotments of public land are enforced with due diligence, promptitude, and institutional rigour, so that any breach or non-adherence to the conditions of the licence does not remain unattended to for inordinately long periods," it said.

"Public authorities entrusted with the management of valuable public assets must remain vigilant to ensure that such land is utilised strictly in accordance with the purpose for which it is allotted and that deviations are addressed in a timely manner," the court added.The bench said it "simply cannot countenance a situation where prime public land continues to be occupied for decades together, without fulfilment of the conditions of licence."The court said that since 1979, the sole condition was that UNI construct an office complex on the land, but that was never done.

"What is, however, indisputably clear is that, despite the passage of several decades, there has been a complete and abject failure to achieve the very purpose underlying the allotment/licence: that the petitioner was required to construct, at its own cost and expense, a multi-storied office complex over the land in question," the court said.

"The petitioner was expressly obligated to use the land solely for the purpose of constructing the office complex to accommodate its own office and the offices of various news media organisations," it added.

A senior Delhi Police officer said that a team was sent to provide security to the agency as it carried out the order. UNI, however, claimed on social media that its staff was forcibly evicted, female journalists were manhandled by police and some police personnel were intoxicated. Police denied all the claims. |

The ministry's land and development office has barred anyone from entering the office without its permission.