Bombay high court fines 75-year-old woman Rs 10 lakh

A division bench of justices SC Dharmadhikari and BP Colabawalla, last week, directed the businesswoman, Renuka Batlivala, to pay the amount to BMC within four weeks, failing which, the civic body will recover it as arrears of land revenue.

The Bombay high court (HC) recently imposed a fine of Rs10 lakh on a 75-year-old businesswoman for filing a “frivolous litigation” against the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) in relation to two plots of land owned by the civic body in Powai and “wasting precious time of the court”.

Bombay high court fines 75-year-old woman Rs 10 lakh( Photo by Bhushan Koyande )

A division bench of justices SC Dharmadhikari and BP Colabawalla, last week, directed the businesswoman, Renuka Batlivala, to pay the amount to BMC within four weeks, failing which, the civic body will recover it as arrears of land revenue. The judges noted that Batlivala’s petition, challenging a February 1, 2019 BMC order which directed her to vacate the two plots of land in Powai within two weeks, was “nothing but an abuse of process of the court”. The HC “litigants who waste precious judicial time should be saddled with costs.” Batlivala had in her petition claimed that the two BMC-owned plots, admeasuring 2,247 sqm, had been leased to her predecessors in the Sixties. When the lease expired in April 2001, the hydraulics engineer had, in a letter dated November 4, 2003, extended it by 30 years. She said even if it was assumed that the leases were not extended, the BMC cannot issued an eviction order without a notice and an opportunity to hear her.