Hyderabad: A Public Interest Litigation (PIL) challenging the constitutional validity of the new Telangana Rights in Land and Pattadar Passbook Act, 2020, has been filed in the state high court by Congress leader and ex-deputy chief minister C. Damodara Rajanarsimha on Wednesday.
In his PIL, Rajanarasimha alleged that the new act infringes upon Article 14 of the Indian constitution, which is part of our fundamental rights guaranteed by the constitution. The PIL states that there is no provision for mutating the names of the Pattadars who acquired rights by way of ORC, 38-E certificate under Tenancy Act and other modes of acquisition. Section 5 (1) of the Act states.
Based on the petition, a division bench of the Telangana high court comprising chief justice Satish Chandra Sharma and justice A. Rajshekar Reddy issued notices to Telangana Chief secretary, the Telangana government, Principal Secretary, the Revenue Department and also Chief Commissioner of Land administration.
As per the act, any person who intends to transfer or obtain an interest in land by way of sale, gift, mortgage or exchange under a registered document shall apply, through the website prescribed for this purpose, to the registrar for allotting available date and time to present the document as per the convenience of the person.
The main concern raised in the PIL is that the provisions of the act violate Article 14 of Constitution of India. The main contention is that the state while providing for cancellation of fraudulent issuance of passbook in respect of government land, has not provided for any mechanism in respect of fraudulent issuance of passbook of private lands. The PIL also stated that the act doesn’t provide for registering of any other document other than sale, gift, mortgage or exchange deed in respect of agricultural land.