MADURAI: The Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court on Tuesday (July 21) directed the Tamil Nadu Electricity Board (TNEB) authorities to restore the electricity connection to a petitioner's shop immediately and granted an interim injunction restraining the authorities from evicting him without following due process of law.
The interim order was passed by a Division Bench comprising Justices CV Karthikeyan and Sakthivel on a writ petition filed by A Rajendran, a resident of Thuraiyur in Tiruchirappalli district.
The petition was listed as an urgent matter. When it came up for hearing, the petitioner's counsel told the court that Rajendran had been running an optical shop on a piece of land that he purchased in 2019 and had been regularly paying property tax and electricity charges.
However, Thuraiyur MLA Ravishankar, who is also the Deputy Speaker of the Assembly, allegedly acted out of political vendetta and visited the property on July 15 along with the Revenue Inspector and the Assistant Engineer of Tangedco. The petitioner alleged that the MLA orally instructed the electricity official to disconnect the power supply to his shop and directed the Revenue Inspector to evict him within three days.
Petitioner blamed Thuraiyur MLA Ravishankar for alleged political vendetta and said he visited the property on July 15 along with Revenue Inspector and Tangedco AE
The petitioner further alleged that, acting on the MLA's instructions, officials of the Revenue and Electricity Departments disconnected the electricity supply to his shop. He further stated that the Revenue Department had issued a notice stating that if the shop was not vacated within three days, it would be demolished and removed.
Despite Rajendran producing his title documents, the Revenue Inspector allegedly ignored his objections, threatened eviction without following due process, and later affixed a notice under Section 7 of the Tamil Nadu Land Encroachment Act directing him to vacate the premises by July 19.
Challenging the notice issued under Section 7 of the Tamil Nadu Land Encroachment Act, 1905, Rajendran contended that the eviction proceedings had been initiated without jurisdiction, as the property was privately owned under a registered sale deed. He further contended that the authorities didn’t give prior notice for eviction violating the procedure prescribed under the Act.
The petitioner therefore approached the High Court seeking relief. After examining the petition, the Bench directed the Assistant Engineer, Tangedco, to immediately restore the petitioner's electricity connection. It also granted an interim injunction restraining the authorities from taking any coercive action against the petitioner without following due process of law.
The Bench further directed the Tiruchy District Collector and the Revenue authorities to file their counter affidavit and adjourned the matter for further hearing.