Miniplex complex under construction at mahanadi vihar in cuttack. picture by badrika nath daslalmohan patnaik

Cuttack, Dec. 15: The construction of a miniplex at Mahanadi Vihar has come under scrutiny of Orissa High Court.

A PIL has alleged that the private party, which was provided land for the purpose on auction lease by Cuttack Development Authority, had grabbed prime government land adjacent to the 9,548sqft plot.

The PIL, filed by Sanjay Kumar Jena, 42, a resident of Mahanadi Vihar on the basis of official documents assessed through RTI, alleged that the state vigilance had detected that the private party was building on land in excess of the auctioned area.

However, it had neither taken any step to demolish the unauthorised construction nor tried to stop the illegal construction. The director general of police (vigilance) had ordered a probe following agitation and demand for inquiry by the local residents.

Acting on the PIL, the division bench of Chief Justice A.K. Goel and Justice A.K. Rath directed the development authority to submit records and details of the land allotted on auction lease to SGBL (India) Limited, Bhubaneswar, for construction of the miniplex at Mahanadi Vihar. The court issued the order last Wednesday and expected the development authority to submit the details within 10 days.

Official documents attached to the petition reveal that the plot was allotted to SGBL on December 28, 2010. The vigilance inquiry had revealed that construction had been carried out over 58.92sqm of excess land.

On detection of the anomaly, the development authority had initiated an unauthorised construction case against Sankar Gupta, the managing direction of SGBL.

However, no step was taken to demolish the illegal construction and stop further unauthorised construction.

The construction undertaken for the miniplex complex at the entrance of a housing area “will create traffic hazard for the locality”, the petition contended.