Cuttack: Orissa High Court has expressed dismay over a bid to grab government land by way of encroachment in the name of a deity in Berhampur Municipal Corporation limits.

The court was appalled by the way in which the deity - Sri Kothari Thakurani - had been used by a trustee, and how two subordinate courts had affirmed possession of the land in favour of the deity.

The then Berhampur Municipality (now corporation) had turned to the high court in 2004 after the subordinate court orders.

The matter had since languished till the high court recently quashed the lower courts' orders.

The orders had got passed on the contention that the deity had been in possession of the land for more than 100 years, and the trustee of the deity constructed shop rooms. During national emergency in 1976-77, the shop rooms were demolished without any notice. Thereafter, the municipality had made unauthorised construction over the land of the deity.

Both the lower courts had concurrently held that the deity was the true owner of the land by virtue of adverse possession.

But, the high court's single-judge bench of Justice A.K. Rath ruled that "the courts below fell into patent error" by declaring the ownership of the deity "by way of adverse possession".

Adverse possession stands for encroaching and occupying a land without being evicted for years.

Justice Rath gave the ruling on May 9, taking note that the land was recorded as "sarbasadharan" (for the use of general public) in the Record of Rights, the state government had transferred it to the municipality, along with a gazette notification on February 14, 1964, and the civic body had since constructed a shopping complex on the land.

The high court felt it was highly inconceivable that a deity would claim ownership by way of adverse possession.

"If the deity files a suit by encroaching upon others land, then nobody would be safe," Justice Rath said, citing a similar judgment.