NEW DELHI: In an important clarification to its two-year-old judgement against ‘bulldozer justice’, Supreme Court said its ruling does not bar use of bulldozers to remove rampant illegal constructions and encroachments on public land following compliance with the procedure laid down in municipal laws.Refusing to adjudicate individual contempt petitions alleging demolition of houses, mosques and other structures in flagrant violation of the elaborate procedure laid down in SC’s Nov 13, 2024, judgement, a bench of CJI Surya Kant and Justices Joymalya Bagchi and V Mohana said in each case there has to be a fact-finding exercise to ascertain whether authorities took steps arbitrarily and that jurisdictional HCs would be in better position to carry out this exercise.When the petitioners alleged bulldozers were used to remove houses, kiosks or shanties, the bench said, “There are rampant illegal constructions and encroachments in public places. That is not the area where SC has commented on use of bulldozers. SC was concerned about the pick-and-choose policy of authorities for demolitions, like using bulldozers only on houses of accused persons when illegal constructions were all around those properties.”

Justice Bagchi said, “Bulldozers need to be used when the rule of law is thwarted by a comfortable corruption between municipal authorities and illegal encroachers. But we also need to ensure that under the guise of implementing law, there should not be a categorisation of individuals. It runs against basic tenets of rule of law.“Let us say everyone in the area has violated the law and encroached onto a footpath. But authorities cannot single out encroachment of a family if one of its members is an accused in a criminal case to create a demonstration of reprisal. That is when the rule of law comes under scrutiny.” The foundation of the 2024 SC judgement is not a blanket ban on removal of all illegal and unauthorised constructions on public land. Bulldozers can be used to remove unauthorised structures from public land, but after scrupulously following the process specified in municipal laws, the bench said. In the judgement, SC had laid down an elaborate process of issuing notice detailing illegalities in a structure, 15 days’ time for owner to respond to the notice, grant of personal hearing, passing of final order, and then another 15 days from final order to appeal against it before appellate forum or courts.However, SC in its judgement had also clarified that “these directions will not be applicable in cases of unauthorised constructions in any public place such as road, street, footpath, abutting railway line or any river body or water bodies and also to cases where there is an order for demolition made by a court of law.” SC said it would transfer all petitions alleging violations of SC judgement in removal of illegal structure to jurisdictional HCs after additional solicitor generals Aishwrya Bhati and Anil Kumar Kaushik said that each case involves different sets of disputed facts and, hence, the need for the fact-finding exercise. It said HCs would take the help of district judicial officers to ascertain facts on the ground before proceedings to decide the petitions.