News
Owner seeks return of unutilised land acquired by UDA 30 years ago
View(s):A land acquired by the Urban Development Authority for a development project is likely to be returned to the owner as it has not been utilized for any public purpose for the past 30 years. The two-and-a-half-acre land at Kirulapone Station Road has remained unutilised for any public purpose, though the UDA claimed that a road development project was put into effect but delayed for several years.
Land owner S.K. Wijetunga wrote to concerned officials, saying he wished to regain his ancestral land, as it was not utilised though a 1984 gazette notification had cited the reasons for the acquisition of the land by the UDA. In a letter, Land Ministry Secretary T. Asoka Pieris acknowledged that a portion of this land, over one-and-a-half acres, had not undergone development. He stated that the Attorney General who was looking into this case had informed that, if the requirements under article 39 (A) of the Land Acquisition Act were fulfilled, there was a possibility for the former owner to regain possession of the block of land.
He also said that as the land was not used for a ‘public purpose’, it was illegal to further agonise the former owner of the land. He recommended that steps should be taken to return the land. The Sunday Times in its March 2 issue reported that the land acquired had not been utilised.
Meanwhile, the Human Rights Commission has also opened an investigation into the matter.