The Telangana High Court directed the Revenue and the HYDRAA officials to restore the land of 13.17 acres at Kukatpally village in Medchal Malkajgiri district to the condition it existed prior to May 25. 

Justice Nagesh Bheemapaka of the HC vacation bench, instructed them to undo all acts of demolition of the property, including reinstating the compound fencing along the entire perimeter of the land, within 24 hours of receiving the order copy. The company undertake the restoration works if the officials failed to comply with the order, the judge said. 

However, “all costs, charges and expenses incurred therein shall be quantified and recovered from the personal funds” of the respondent officials/contemnors, the order said. The officers, their servants, agents and all persons acting under their authority are restrained from interfering with the petitioner’s possession of the property, the direction said. 

The restoration work included re-constructing the tin-sheet security rooms, restoring all electricity service lines, lighting infrastructure plus allied electric installations, removing all fencing and signage or boards erected by the authorities along with withdrawal of all persons deployed by HYDRAA and revenue officials at the property. The petitioner company contended that it got the land regularised under GO Ms. No. 469 by paying ₹9.27 crore to the government in 2008. 

Eventually, the HC in three different writ petitions passed orders. In one of them, the HC restrained the government from interfering with the property. Yet on May 26 around 3.50 p.m., the revenue and the HYDRAA authorities with their teams arrived at the land and disturbed the property, the petitioner said.  

Observing that the petitioner had “made out a strong prima facie case of wilful disobedience of the HC order”, the judge noted that the balance of convenience lies wholly in favour of the petitioner in the present case. “…and grave and irreparable injury would be occasioned if the consequences of the prima facie breach are permitted to subsist..”, the judge said in the order. 

The judge remarked that the conduct of the HYDRAA complained by the petitioner was “neither novel nor isolated”. “But it is illustrative of a settle and recurring modus operandi on the part of HYDRAA namely to demolish first, to fence and fix boards next, and to seek justification thereafter, treating the orders of this court as an inconvenience to be circumvented rather than as a command to be obeyed,” the judge said in the order. 

The judge said the bench recorded its “strong disapproval of the brazenness that prima facie marks the conducts of the HYDRAA, an instrumentality of the State, which secured time from this court on the strength of a solemn undertaking that it would act only by following the due process of law”. The three contempt cases were posted to June 4 for next hearing.