Gujarat High Court Holds Fifty-Year Road Reservation Lapsed, Says Belated Revisions Cannot Defeat Owner's Section 20(2) Right

Gujarat High Court declares a Deesa road reservation lapsed after finding the Nagarpalika revised its Development Plan years after the statutory ten-year window had closed.

The Gujarat High Court has declared that a Development Plan road reservation over land in Village Nava Deesa, Banaskantha district, has lapsed under Section 20 of the Gujarat Town Planning and Urban Development Act, 1976. Justice Niral R. Mehta, sitting singly, allowed a writ petition filed by landowner Ajaykumar Babulal Gehlot against the State of Gujarat and Deesa Nagarpalika, holding that the authorities could not rely on their own delayed revisions of the Development Plan to defeat a statutory right that had already accrued in the petitioner's favour. The land, admeasuring 2529 square metres across Survey Nos. 41 and 42/P4, had remained under reservation since the original Development Plan came into force on 30.11.1975 — nearly fifty years without acquisition.

The Dispute Before the Court

The petitioner claimed ownership of the land, which was first reserved for a Development Plan road in the Draft Development Plan published on 10.10.1975. According to the petition, the reservation continued through a revised Development Plan sanctioned on 25.04.1994 and again through a second revised Development Plan sanctioned on 07.01.2016, valid for a further ten years. No acquisition proceedings were ever initiated.

Invoking Section 20(2) of the Act, the petitioner served a purchase notice on the competent authority on 04.05.2022, calling upon it to acquire the land. Respondent No.3, Deesa Nagarpalika, replied on 17.06.2022 stating that the ten-year period under Section 20 had to be reckoned from the date of sanction of the revised Development Plan, i.e. 07.01.2016 — meaning the statutory period had not yet expired when the notice was issued. Aggrieved, the petitioner approached the High Court under Article 226.

By consent of the parties, the petition was taken up for final hearing at the admission stage. Advocate S.P. Majmudar appeared for the petitioner, Assistant Government Pleader Sahil Trivedi for the State authorities, and advocate Abhijit Rathod for advocate Mehul Rathod appeared for respondent No.3, Deesa Nagarpalika.

Competing Readings of Sections 20 and 21

For the petitioner, Majmudar argued that the land had been under reservation for nearly forty years without any inclination to acquire it, in violation of Article 300A. He submitted that once the statutory notice under Section 20(2) was served and six months lapsed without acquisition or steps toward acquisition, the reservation stood deemed lapsed by operation of law. He contended that the ten-year period under Section 20(2) must run from the date the final Development Plan first came into force in 1975, and that accepting the respondent's reading — restarting the clock with every revision — would render Section 20(2) “otiose and devoid of any practical efficacy.” He relied on Palitana Sugar Mill Private Limited v State of Gujarat, Bhavnagar University v Palitana Sugar Mill Private Limited, Hariben Meghabhai Jasoliya v State of Gujarat, Mrugee Traders And Developers v Bhavnagar Area Development Authority, and Shardaben Lallubhai Patel v Vadodara Urban Development Authority.

For Deesa Nagarpalika, Rathod argued that the petitioner's notice was premature since the last sanctioned Development Plan came into force only on 07.01.2016, and ten years from that date had not lapsed when the notice was served on 04.05.2022. He submitted that a revised Development Plan prepared under Section 21 is, for all practical purposes, a fresh final Development Plan, because the entire procedure under Sections 9 to 20 — including invitation of public objections and sanction by the competent authority — applies afresh to any revision. On this reading, every revision restarts the ten-year clock under Section 20(2). He relied on Babubhai Kurjibhai Radadiya v Surat Municipal Corporation & Ors, decided in Letters Patent Appeal No.1263 of 2011.

How the Bench Reasoned

The Court framed two questions of law: whether the competent authority can exercise its power under Section 21 to revise a Development Plan after the ten-year period under Section 20(2) has already expired, and whether such revision can defeat a right that has already accrued to the landowner under Section 20(2).

Justice Mehta undertook a section-by-section reading of the Act, from Section 9 through Section 21, tracing the statutory scheme for preparation, publication, sanction and revision of a Development Plan. Section 17 provides that a sanctioned draft Development Plan, notified by the State Government, becomes the “final development plan,” binding on the area development authority and all other authorities in the area. Section 20(2) then operates as a safeguard: if land reserved under the plan is not acquired, or acquisition proceedings are not commenced, within ten years of the final Development Plan coming into force, the owner may serve notice on the authority; if the authority fails to acquire the land or commence proceedings within a further six months, the reservation is deemed to have lapsed by operation of law.

The judgment held that this deeming fiction becomes operative only on fulfilment of three conditions: failure to acquire or commence acquisition within ten years of the final plan coming into force, service of the statutory notice, and continued inaction for six months thereafter. Section 21, which requires revision of the Development Plan at least once every ten years, was read alongside this scheme. The Court held that if an authority wishes to invoke Section 21 to revise a plan, it must do so within the prescribed ten-year window; a revision commenced only after that window has closed cannot be treated as a valid exercise of statutory power capable of defeating a right that has already accrued to the owner under Section 20(2).

Applying this to the record, the Court traced the chronology of the plan's revisions. The decision to prepare the first revised Development Plan was taken by Resolution No. 22 of 1986 on 22.09.1986 — after the ten-year period from the 1975 plan had already expired. That first revision was eventually sanctioned only on 26.05.1994, and its own ten-year period expired on 25.05.2004. The decision to prepare the second revision was taken on 30.10.2004, again after expiry of the prescribed period. The draft second revised plan was submitted under Section 9 only on 30.03.2013, submitted under Section 16 on 08.08.2014, and finally sanctioned on 07.01.2016.

The Court found that “at every stage the process of revision was initiated beyond the statutory period of ten years contemplated under Section 21.” It described the record as reflecting “complete administrative lethargy and indifference to the mandate of the Act,” noting that the petitioner had been deprived of beneficial enjoyment of his property for nearly five decades. The judgment observed that while the State and planning authorities possess statutory power to reserve land for public purposes, that power must be exercised within the time limits the legislature has prescribed, and cannot be used to keep private property under reservation indefinitely.

Distinguishing the Radadiya Precedent

The Court rejected the Nagarpalika's reliance on Babubhai Kurjibhai Radadiya, holding it “clearly distinguishable on facts” and inapplicable to the controversy. Since the original final Development Plan came into force on 30.11.1975 and no revision proceedings were initiated within the following ten years, the Court held that any subsequent exercise of the Section 21 power, commenced after that window, could not be recognised as a valid exercise of statutory power so as to defeat rights that had already accrued to the petitioner.

The Court