CHANDIGARH: The Punjab and Haryana high court has ordered the Punjab govt to allot commercial booths to shopkeepers displaced during Operation Blue Star at Rs 1,000 per square yard, matching the rehabilitation rates of the subsequent Galiara Scheme.A division bench of Justices Jasgurpreet Singh Puri and Pravindra Singh Chauhan passed the ruling on Sept 7 on four connected petitions, resolving a long-standing dispute over commercial properties destroyed around Amritsar’s Golden Temple complex during the 1984 operation.“We are actually at pains because the matter pertains to citizens of India who were having their business adjoining Sri Darbar Sahib, Amritsar, and were displaced during Operation Blue Star,“ the bench observed.The court noted that 42 years after the operation, the govt was still deciding the rate at which the displaced shopkeepers should receive alternative sites. It said the state should have acted much earlier to bring the dispute to an end. “It was obligatory upon the state to have acted promptly for rehabilitation of displaced persons, which the state has failed to do so,” the HC said.Invoking the legal maxim fiat justitia ruat caelum (“let justice be done, though the heavens fall“), the court noted that the state agreed in 1991 and 2006 to rehabilitate the oustees on terms equal to the Galiara Scheme. Under that scheme, commercial tenants received alternative sites at Rs 1,000 per square yard alongside construction subsidies.However, the state govt in 2012 fixed the rate for the Operation Blue Star oustees at the prevailing collector‘s rate of Rs 38,400 per square yard. The high court ruled there was no justification for the sudden departure, describing the resulting differential treatment as “ex facie unfair, discriminatory and arbitrary”.The court concluded that govt had been “totally unfair, discriminatory and unsympathetic” towards the displaced shopkeepers.Under the ruling, eligible petitioners will be allotted alternative sites at Rs 1,000 per square yard, with all Galiara Scheme benefits extended to them. Five additional eligible applicants previously excluded due to space constraints must also be offered sites at the same rate.Amounts previously deposited by petitioners at Rs 10,000 per square yard under an interim Supreme Court order will be adjusted against final costs, with any excess refunded.The court left undisturbed allotments accepted by 18 beneficiaries who had already paid the full Rs 38,400 per square yard rate.The court said its directions were being issued in view of the “rigour and hardship” faced by the petitioners for 42 years, which, it held, had infringed their fundamental rights under Articles 14, 19 and 21 of the Constitution.The Punjab govt was given two months to complete allotments, register sale deeds and hand over physical possession.
