HC to HYDRAA: follow orders, not hunches
Two separate court orders in a week pulled up HYDRAA over entries on disputed lands — Lothukunta and Bahadurguda — and told the State to slow the bulldozers and show the paperwork. The BJP-led Centre is silent, as usual, on basic due process when it is not a headline in Delhi.
The High Court ordered restraint while competing land records are examined.
The High Court has stepped in on two unrelated HYDRAA-linked land disputes and, in plain terms, told the State to respect its own undertakings and the court’s orders.
Lothukunta, Malkajgiri: hearing contempt petitions by Shanta Sriram Constructions over land in Survey Nos. 1 and 2, Justice Anil Kumar Jukanti noted material showing the parcel as private property and pulled up HYDRAA for entering despite earlier directions and an undertaking to the court, according to a court-reporting account. The judge ordered HYDRAA commissioner A.V. Ranganath to appear, tender an unconditional apology and assure non-entry; he also recalled an earlier direction coordinating Army protection at the site, per reports. HYDRAA’s side said the land is B2 under the Secunderabad Cantonment and part of government property, relying on the 1937 GLR; its counsel sought time to place the State’s version on record. The exact acreage in question varies across reports and needs the certified order before anyone pretends precision.
Bahadurguda, Shamshabad: in petitions by farmers and private landowners over patta lands in Survey Nos. 3 and 5, Justice B. Vijay Sen Reddy restrained HYDRAA and Revenue officials from coercive action, including demolition, pending further orders, and continued status quo on structures in connected petitions that mention Survey Nos. 37, 39, 40, 41, 42 and 54. Petitioners alleged a July 18 entry with JCBs and police, and damage to gates and fencing; these are allegations on record, not findings. The Advocate General said the State acted only on government land in Survey Nos. 28 and 62 and that other claims would be verified. The court’s interim line is simple: protect what’s proven State property, don’t touch what’s contested until the records are checked.
Ranganath later alleged that “land mafias” misled courts and named Shanta Sriram as attempting to usurp high-value land — his claim, not an established fact. The orders on both matters are interim and contempt-related; title in Bahadurguda is not decided on the present material. Also unresolved in the Lothukunta case: whether the Army was actually deployed and the precise acreage the direction covered. The Congress and the BJP both love a law-and-order presser; neither is in a hurry to defend due process when a Hyderabad agency skips the queue.