Cuttack, May 22: A ruling by Orissa High Court has termed the state housing board's decision to impose watch and ward charges for the period between allotment of a house and taking physical possession as illegal.

It also quashed the cancellation of the allotment for non-payment of the charges.

The ruling came for the 1995 case against the Odisha State Housing Board filed by Pramod Kumar Panda after the board had cancelled the allotment of a LIG House under the Dumduma Housing Scheme in Bhubaneswar for non-payment of the watch and ward charges.

Panda's father had been allotted the house on August 21, 1987. He had made an initial deposit of Rs 7,500 and was to pay the remaining Rs 22,500 in 52 equal instalments, according to an August 1989 agreement.

Though the board failed to deliver possession of the house on the scheduled date (November 1989), it began to levy Rs 200 a month as watch and ward charges from that month.

Watch and ward charges are fees that an executing agency charges for looking after a property before handing over physical possession. In 1993, the board intimated Panda's father that he had to pay Rs 12,500 towards the charges and take physical possession on August 30 of that year.

But he could not take possession as the house was left in an incomplete state - there were no railings on the windows or toilet doors, damaged flooring and plastering. The board cancelled the allotment on February 10, 1995. Panda challenged the order as his father had died by then.

Now, the division bench of Chief Justice Vineet Saran and Justice K.R. Mohapatra ruled that "the levy of watch and ward charges cannot be justified in law, and consequently cancellation of the allotment of the LIG House cannot be justified in law in the absence of such provision".

"It cannot be also justified in law in view of the fact that possession of the house had not been given to the father of the petitioner as per the scheduled date, because the house was not complete in all respects for handing over possession," the judges ruled.

"Accordingly, the order cancelling the allotment of the house is quashed and the demand for payment of watch and ward charges is held to be illegal," the judges said in the May 9 order, a copy of which was made available yesterday.

The high court has directed the board to hand over physical possession of the house to Panda within two months from the filing of a certified copy of the order before its chairman. It has also directed that in case any instalment on the payment was due, the petitioner should pay the same within six weeks of taking possession of the house.