This Court dismissed the appellant's intra-Court appeal from a Single Judge's order under Article 226 Constitution dismissing a petition opposing temple construction on railway land, holding the appellant lacked locus standi and the land did not belong to the church.
No order as to costs.
This page shows the compact analysis of this judgement. The full analysis — procedural history, issue-by-issue holdings with ratio and obiter, advocates, and paragraph-level evidence for every claim — is being added to the record in batches and will appear here when this judgement has been through it.
IN THE HIGH COURT OF ORISSA AT CUTTACK
W.A. No.2725 of 2023
Joljen Lakra
… Appellant
Mr. Bharat Kumar Mishra, Advocate
-versus-
… State of Odisha and Others Respondents Mr. P.K.Parhi, Deputy Solicitor General assisted by Ms. Babita Sahu, CGC
Mr. Debakanta Mohanty, Addl. Govt. Advocate
CORAM: THE CHIEF JUSTICE MR. JUSTICE MURAHARI SRI RAMAN
Order No.
ORDER 19.03.2024
Page 1 of 4
place of worshiped i.e. the Christian Church of the petitioner by taking forcible steps for construction of a Hindu temple within the premises in contravention of the provision under the Places of Worship (Special Provision) Act, 1991.
“5. Taking note of the grievance of the Petitioner as well as documents produced, the Collector and District Magistrate, Sundargarh arrived at the following finding
“On the other hand the officials of Railway Department present in the meeting produced some documents like the order dated 25.01.1996 in Misc case No. 65/95 of Learned
Page 2 of 4
Court of Civil Judge Senior Division) Rourkela and an undertaking of the president of GEL Church to the effect that the matter of dispute is settled in the office chamber of the ADEN/ROU and the petitioner will not proceed further with any construction work beyond the encroached area of Ac. 0.08. But in spite of that they are creating disturbances and in the meantime they have constructed a toilets forcibly for which the Senior Section Engineer(Works), 5.E Railway, Rourkela has requested 1.1.C. Rourkela for dismantling But the same could not be executed due to agitation of Church authority (Xerox copy submitted as Annexure-E). The balance area of Ac. 0.98 decimal is lying vacant and being used as play ground and as and when required for various occasion.
Hence as the land belongs to Railway the stand of the petitioner does not hold good to be considered by the Revenue Administration.
However, at last the petitioner may move to appropriate forum for the same, since the Railway authority is the absolute owner of the land in question.”
“From the above, it appears that at no stage, the Petitioner has made any grievance with regard to construction of a temple over the land in question. It further appears that the Petitioner having lost in all the fora has approached this Court with a baseless allegation that a temple is being forcibly constructed over the land in question. Admittedly, the land does not belong to the GEL Church. The Church is in forcible possession over the same. The allegation made in this writ petition is also
Page 3 of 4
without any basis. Hence, this Court finds no merit in the writ petition.”
(Chakradhari Sharan Singh)
Chief Justice
(M.S. Raman)
Judge
S.K.Jena/Secy
Signature Not Verified
Digitally Signed Signed by: SANJAY KUMAR JENA Designation: SECRETARY Reason: Authentication Location: High Court of Orissa, Cuttack. Date: 21-Mar-2024 11:40:01
Page 4 of 4
2 issues framed by the court
Whether the appellant has the locus standi to maintain the writ appeal.
Whether the learned Single Judge erred in finding the land does not belong to the petitioner church.
2 provisions across 2 enactments
Joljen Lakra
State of Odisha
Murahari Sri Raman
Chakradhari Sharan Singh
As recorded by the court registry
Judgements on the same questions, provisions and authorities, from every court
