The Delhi High Court has issued firm directives to the Delhi Development Authority (DDA), urging it to fast-track its longstanding disputes through collaborative and peaceful solutions. The court’s goal is to ease the burden of endless litigation while fostering settlements.
Justice Dharmesh Sharma called upon the DDA to streamline its caseload, directing its panel lawyers to identify ten cases each, focusing on issues like property mutation, unauthorized constructions, leasehold to freehold conversions, and flat allotments.
To drive this process, the DDA’s Vice Chairman has been ordered to establish a review committee. This committee will regularly meet, either weekly or fortnightly, to assess recommendations from DDA lawyers and explore resolutions through Lok Adalats or the Delhi High Court Mediation and Conciliation Centre.
In a strategic move, the court mandated that the review committee invite inputs from panel lawyers by September 7, 2024, and hold daily meetings starting September 9, 2024. The committee is tasked with submitting a case-wise proposal by September 12, 2024, to the Secretary of the Delhi High Court Legal Services Committee, with the goal of presenting these cases in the Lok Adalat scheduled for September 14, 2024.
If cases cannot be resolved in Lok Adalats, they will be referred to the Delhi High Court Mediation and Conciliation Centre for further negotiations. The committee will also be responsible for tracking monthly progress, compiling a balance sheet of settlements reached.
This direction emerged from a contempt petition against the DDA, with the court expressing concern over delayed resolutions and an overload of unnecessary cases, which have made the DDA one of the country’s most frequent litigants. While the contempt charges against the DDA were dropped, the court emphasized the need for faster, more effective dispute resolution.
