The government informed the Division Bench of Chief Justice T.S. Thakur and Justice Hemant Gupta of the Punjab and Haryana High Court that the Council of Ministers, at its meeting held on December 2, amended the policy regarding the allotment of plots/houses to riot victims.
The new policy comes in the wake of High Court directions to the Punjab government to submit a sworn statement to clear the air over whether it would implement a scheme to rehabilitate victims of anti-Sikh riots.
The Bench of Chief Justice, in its November 11 order, had stated: "There is nothing on record before us to show whether any policy regarding the allotment of booths or residential accommodation was formulated by the state government for the benefit of riot victims."
During the resumed hearing of a petition on Tuesday, praying for a mandamus seeking directions to the state government to implement decisions relating to rehabilitation benefits to the victims of the 1984 riots, Anita Bhalla, Under Secretary, Department of Revenue, Rehabilitation and Disaster Management filed an affidavit.
The affidavit reads, "It was decided that unauthorised occupation of eligible riot victims over the houses/booths should be regularised.
Accordingly , necessary instructions were issued… for necessary action." The state government informed the court that as per the amended policy , land for 327, 200 and 200 booths at Ludhiana, S.A.S. Nagar and Patiala, respectively , would be allotted at 50 per cent of the last auction price to eligible riot victims by PUDA.
As per the affidavit, the Cabinet had also approved alloting to the riot victims 364 government staff quarters in Ludhiana, including 69 houses under unauthorised possession of the victims and 295 vacant government staff quarters.
These houses would be allotted at the price prevailing in 1991-92. The state government further informed the Bench that there were 637 houses under unauthorised occupation and that 1,330 other LIG/MIG houses were available for allotment under this new decision of the Cabinet. In order to meet the remaining 50 per cent cost of land of 727 booths and 2,017 houses (which includes 50 houses already allotted to riot victims) Rs 8,102 lakh had been released to Department of Housing and Urban Development on January 15.
As per the policy , the eligible riot victims are those who had migrated to Punjab from November 1, 1984, to December 11, 1985, due to the November 1984 riots and had got themselves registered with deputy commissioners of the districts in which they had been residing. As per the earlier decision, all Sikh migrant widows, destitutes, etc.
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