Delhi High Court on Wednesday directed the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs to ask illegal occupants of government accommodations living since 1998 to vacate the houses within the next 15 days.
The court was hearing a petition filed by an orgsation named Anti-Corruption Council of India.
A division bench of Chief Justice DN Patel and Justice C Hari Shankar told the ministry to put the belongings of the people illegally occupying government accommodation on the road if they do not vacate the house.
The High Court clarified that if there is stay order over vacating of any houses by any tribunal or court, then the ministry should not do anything about the houses or the occupants.
The matter was listed for further hearing on February 27.
The court also pulled up the Ministry for its ineffective approach to vacate 575 illegally occupied government accommodations in the national capital and imposed a fine of Rs 10,000 against the secretary of Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, which will be deducted from his salary.
The ministry informed the court that crores of rupees are due to the government from the people, who are illegally occupying these government accommodations.
There are a total of 11 former MPs, including AP Jithender Reddy, Murali Mohan Maganti, Ranjeet Ranjan, Dhananjay Mahadik, Dr. K Gopal, Veena Devi, Tej Pratap Singh Yadav, Manohar Untwal, Udit Raj, KC Ramamurthy, and Sanjay Sinh, who illegally occupied government accommodations.
While some of them have vacated the accommodation, their dues are still pending.
( With inputs from ANI )