(15) Section 449 of Municipal Act requires Municipal Commissioner or Executive Officer of the Corporation to be vigilant enough to ensure that any building, if it is likely to fall on account of it being in a ruinous state or in any way dangerous, is either demolished, or, in the alternative, repaired depending upon the condition of an individual building. For this purpose he has not to wait for the application of the owner of the said building and can start with this exercise suo motu after serving notice upon the owner of the building and simultaneously to the occupier also, if any. However, the notice is required to be in writing only. What is expected of the Commissioner or the Executive Officer of the Municipal Corporation is that after the notice is served in writing on the owner, the said notice shall be put on some conspicuous part of the wall or building. This is in addition to serving of notice on the owner. The words “or served on the occupier” in this context, also assumes significance if read conjointly with the words “and to be put on some conspicuous part of the wall or building or served on the occupier”. This, in fact, is the inbuilt modes of informing the occupier of the building, if any, after the notice is served upon the owner of the said building. Therefore, in no case, the concerned official of Municipal Corporation can afford to skip serving the occupier of the building with a notice before demolishing the building or getting the same repaired, as the case may require. In this context, the words “as the case may require” have also their significance.
