The Lucknow bench of the Allahabad High Court on Saturday restrained the Uttar Pradesh government from acquiring a private property on the city's posh Mall Avenue allegedly for merging it with huge chunks of land acquired in its neighbourhood in the name of different in-house outfits of the ruling Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP).
The petitioner alleged intimidation by officials of the Lucknow Development Authority (LDA), who had reportedly made a futile attempt to run a bulldozer over the boundary wall of the bungalow, situated in the state capital's most prestigious locality.
Even though it was a court holiday, a special two-judge bench comprising Justice Rajeev Sharma and Justice Anil Kumar heard the petition at the former's residence.
The bench took serious note of the arbitrariness with which the century-old lease of the petitioner was cancelled.
While staying the demolition order, the court has fixed Aug 13 for the next hearing.