A Division Bench of the Kerala High Court has stayed for two weeks a government order allowing owners of the government assigned land to cut and remove the trees except sandalwood standing on their assigned land.
The Bench comprising Chief Justice S. Manikumar and Justice Shaji P. Chali passed the stay order on a public interest litigation filed by One Earth One Life, an NGO in Thrissur.
When the petition came up for hearing, the counsel for the petitioner pointed out that the order was issued by the Revenue Department in March saying that there was some ambiguity regarding the right of the assignees over the trees growing on their land.
According to the petitioner, the Kerala Land Assignment Rules 1984 had vested the government with the full ownership right over the trees on the assigned land. As per the rules, the assignees was bound to take care of such trees standing on their land at the time of assignment. In fact, the government had taken away the ownership right of the trees on the assigned land or patta land by issuing the order.
The petitioner contended that the order would cause heavy loss to the government as valuable trees such as ebony would be cut and removed by the owners of the patta land. The order was issued with mala fide intention.
Besides, the condition in the assignment deed that the trees on the land should not be cut and removed could not be altered. It was inconsistent with the rules 10(3) of the Kerala Land Assignment Rules which prohibits cutting and removal of trees from the assigned land.
Besides, the government had no power to amend the rules by way of a circular or order. If the order was implemented, it would lead to indiscriminate felling of trees and consequent ecological imbalance, the petitioner said.
The Bench while staying the order observed that it was prima facie of the view that the government should not permit the assignees to cut trees by altering the condition in the patta.
