HC: Fresh application not needed for lapsed building permission

HC: Fresh application not needed for lapsed building permission

TIMES NEWS NETWORK

Chennai:03.12.2020

The Madras high court has made it clear that once a building plan is approved by authorities concerned, fresh application is not required in case of expiry of time for completion of construction.

A mere application for renewal is sufficient under the District Municipalities Act, if there are no changes in the approved plan, Justice N Anand Venkatesh said, concurring with the submissions of counsel Abudukumar Rajarathinam.

“…there is no question of once again going through the entire process afresh once the building has already been approved by the authority concerned,” the court added.

This stand has been consistently followed and the court does not find any ground to deviate from this view. In fact, such a construction has been upheld by the Division Bench of this court through an order dated June 13, 2018 the court said.

The issue pertains to pleas moved by Mistair Realty's Private Limited and Jansi Kishore challenging the order of the commissioner of Udhagamandalam Municipality rejecting renewal for their approved building plan.

According to the petitioners, due to an unforeseen exigency, all the money that was saved for putting up the construction was spent on some medical emergency and, therefore, they could not complete the construction within the licensed period.

Subsequently, they applied for renewal of the building approval. However, the same was rejected by the authorities on the ground that the licence period has expired.

Aggrieved they have moved the present plea. When the pleas came up for hearing, advocate Abudukumar Rajarathinam contended that the authorities should not have rejected renewal as there were no changes made to the approved plan.

Opposing the same, the municipality submitted that the petitioners had approached the municipality after a delay of 10 years that too after the expiry of the license period.

Refusing to accept the contention, the court quashed the rejection order and directed issuance of renewal.

A mere application for renewal is sufficient under the District Municipalities Act, if there are no changes in the approved plan, Justice N Anand Venkatesh said