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Rani Mukherjee to move HC in Shirdi land deal case
02nd Apr 2008 09.00 IST
By Agencies

Bollywood star Rani Mukherjee will move the Aurangabad bench of the Bombay High Court today to challenge Ahmednagar district collectorate's order canceling her ownership of a plot near Shirdi due to irregularities in the deal.

"We will be moving the High Court against the governments forfeiture of Rani's land," her lawyer Nanasaheb Chaudhary said from Shirdi Tuesday.

Rani failed to pay penalty after breaching the condition of acquiring ceiling land and thus the land was forfeited by the government earlier this year, Chaudhary added.

The Sub-divisional Officer, Srirampur had ordered the cancellation of Rani's name from the sale deed in January and taken possession of the land.

The actress is said to have paid Rs 33 lakh in December 2005 for a farmland near Shirdi. After the purchase, Rani had paid a stamp duty of Rs 1.32 lakh for registration. But the title of the land could not be transferred to her name, as it was an agriculture land belonging to a farmer.

Inquiry was conducted in to the matter by Deputy Collector but in a land ceiling revision case, only a Divisional Commissioner is empowered to conduct inquiry and not a Collector or SDO, Chaudhry further said.

"We disagree with the findings of district administration. It has said that it was an agricultural land hence it was ceiling land and required special permission from the government for transferring it to a non-farmer," he added.

"The land was already a non-agriculture land hence ceiling was not applicable under Section 47 of Ceiling Act. The issue of the said land being 'non-agricultural land' was not challenged after the Tehsildar had declared it so in 1981," the counsel added.

Also, any matter taken up for revision, has to be done within three years as per Article 137 of Limitation Act. Rani bought the land ten years ago but the district administration is refusing to transfer it on her name, he said.

"On the basis of these points we will file our writ petition," he said.

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