Taking a tough stand to protect government land from encroachers in the state, Himachal Pradesh High Court has directed the state government to evict people illegally occupying more than five, ten bigha or more government lands.
This order was passed by a double bench of the High Court headed by Justice Vivek Thakur and Justice Bipin Chander Negi recently.
The court made it clear in the absence of any policy of the state government to regularize the encroachments above five or ten bigha or above pieces of land.
The court order said, “There is no policy in place, nor any plan in the pipeline, to legalize such large-scale encroachments. Any expectations to the contrary, the bench said, are unfounded and have no legal merit, after the state government made its stand clear that there is no policy to regularize such encroachments.”
The court also set a deadline to clear all encroachments by July 15 and asked the Chief Secretary to implement the eviction orders and submit a compliance report to the order by July 21.
The ruling came in response to three petitions challenging eviction notices served by the Assistant Collector First Class-cum-Tehsildar of Kumarsain, related to encroachments on pasture darkhan (pasture lands with trees) in Sarahan, Kumarsain tehsil. The petitioners argued that the land in question is categorized as unprotected forest land in revenue records and the 2018–19 jamabandi reflects possession by village landholders.
However, the court dismissed these arguments, refusing to grant any relief. It stated that traditional use claims cannot override the legal status of the land and upheld the eviction orders issued by the local authorities.
The petitioners argued, “The land was traditionally used and recorded as unprotected forest in revenue documents, however the court dismissed the claim stating that customary use cannot override the legal status of government land”.
The court also rejected references to a 2017 draft policy and past permissions, calling them legally irrelevant.
