Owners of a fish-and-poultry business challenged the demolition of the sheds they had built on agricultural land in the Chandigarh periphery, saying it was their livelihood and their own land bought through a power of attorney. The Punjab and Haryana High Court dismissed the plea: a power-of-attorney sale confers no title, cannot regularise an unauthorised structure, and a livelihood claim cannot licence a breach of the periphery-control law.
Chandigarh: The Punjab and Haryana High Court has dismissed a writ petition challenging a demolition order passed under the Punjab New Capital (Periphery) Control Act, 1952, holding that a General Power of Attorney or a similar instrument confers no right, title or interest in land, and cannot operate to regularise an unauthorised structure or validate the unauthorised use of land [Shamshid Ahmed and Others v. Union of India and Others].
A Bench of Justice Jasgurpreet Singh Puri and Justice Pravindra Singh Chauhan dismissed the petition, holding the demolition order to have been passed in accordance with the statute and after due compliance with the principles of natural justice.
The case
The petitioners, who said they had for two to three decades run a fish-farming and poultry business, challenged an April 2026 order directing the removal of construction raised on land at village Mani Majra, Chandigarh, as unauthorised and in contravention of the 1952 Act. They contended that they had purchased the land, constructed animal sheds and other structures, held electricity connections and paid bills, and that the demolition order had been passed on a neighbour’s complaint despite their ownership documents, without acting on their representation seeking a rehabilitation policy.
The respondents, the Union and the Chandigarh Administration, submitted that the land was admittedly agricultural and fell within the notified “Control Area” under the 1952 Act, that the petitioners had no right to raise construction or carry on commercial activity on it, and that the demolition order had been passed after due notice and an opportunity of hearing.
A power of attorney confers no title
Central to the petitioners’ claim was their assertion of ownership through a sale deed executed on the basis of a General Power of Attorney, Will, agreement and Special Power of Attorney. The Court rejected that foundation, holding that the petitioners’ own sale deed described the land as agricultural, and that a subsequent purchaser cannot claim a higher or better title than the seller, nor a right to raise unauthorised construction or change the use of land without obtaining permission.
Applying the settled position that a General Power of Attorney and like documents do not convey title, the Court held that such instruments cannot confer any right, title or interest in the land, cannot operate to regularise an unauthorised structure, and cannot validate the unauthorised use of land. The petitioners’ entire case, resting on that mode of acquisition, therefore could not sustain a right to build on Control-Area agricultural land.
Livelihood is not a licence to violate the statute
On the plea that the structures were the petitioners’ source of livelihood, the Court accepted that the right to livelihood is an integral part of the right to life under Article 21, but held that it is not absolute and cannot be stretched to protect an activity that is otherwise illegal. A livelihood claim, however genuine, could not confer a right to raise or continue unauthorised structures on agricultural land in the Control Area in the teeth of the express prohibition in Sections 5 and 6 of the 1952 Act; to hold otherwise would allow a violator to perpetuate an illegality merely by calling the illegal structure his source of livelihood, and would render the regulatory scheme redundant.
The Court also rejected the claim to an exemption under Section 15 of the Act as an activity “subservient to agriculture”, holding, following its earlier decision in Bhupinder Singh v. U.T. Chandigarh, that such an activity must bear a direct and proximate connection with agricultural operations and that the exemption applies only to land within the Abadi area of the village, a condition not satisfied here, where the land was agricultural, outside the Abadi area, and the structure, a fish, chicken and meat market, bore no direct nexus to any agricultural activity.
Rehabilitation, natural justice and parity
On rehabilitation, the Court noted that the petitioners had not been deprived of their land or dispossessed; only the unauthorised structures raised in violation of the Act had been directed to be removed, and the absence of a rehabilitation policy specific to such agricultural land could not render the action illegal, especially as the construction had been raised with full knowledge of the statutory restrictions. It held that a general assertion of a breach of natural justice, unaccompanied by particulars of what specific right had been infringed, could not assist the petitioners, the demolition order having been passed after notice and hearing. The plea that the authorities were acting selectively and ignoring illegal construction in adjoining areas was rejected on the principle that there can be no negative parity, no right to equality in illegality.
Holding the demolition order to be free of illegality, infirmity, arbitrariness or perversity, and passed strictly in accordance with the 1952 Act and after due compliance with natural justice, the Court found no ground to interfere in its writ jurisdiction and dismissed the petition.
Why it matters
The judgment applies two well-settled principles that frequently arise in property and planning disputes. The first is that a General Power of Attorney, Will or agreement to sell does not convey ownership; following the Supreme Court’s caution against treating such documents as conveyances, the Court reaffirmed that a purchaser through these instruments acquires no title and, crucially, cannot use them to regularise a structure raised in breach of the law. The second is that periphery and zoning controls, of which the 1952 Act is the vehicle for Chandigarh, restrict the right to build on and change the use of controlled agricultural land, and that construction raised without permission remains unauthorised regardless of the builder’s asserted ownership or investment.
The treatment of the livelihood argument is significant. Courts are alive to the human cost of demolition, and the right to livelihood is a recognised facet of Article 21; but the Court drew a firm line between protecting livelihood and immunising illegality, holding that a genuine livelihood cannot become a shield for a structure the statute prohibits. To accept the contrary, it reasoned, would let anyone defeat a regulatory regime simply by building first and pleading livelihood later. The rejection of “negative parity”, that other violations going unpunished cannot legalise one’s own, reinforces that the legality of a demolition is judged on its own facts, not by reference to unaddressed breaches elsewhere.
The order also marks the limits of what the challenge did and did not involve: the petitioners were not dispossessed of their land, and only the offending structures were ordered removed. For those holding or transacting land in controlled or periphery areas, the decision is a reminder that title and building rights turn on lawful conveyance and statutory permission, and that a power-of-attorney arrangement neither secures the one nor supplies the other.
Case Title: Shamshid Ahmed and Others v. Union of India and Others [CWP-16435-2026]
Bench: Justice Jasgurpreet Singh Puri and Justice Pravindra Singh Chauhan, High Court of Punjab and Haryana at Chandigarh
Date of Decision: September 15, 2026
Status: Writ petition dismissed. Demolition order under the Punjab New Capital (Periphery) Control Act, 1952 upheld; a power-of-attorney sale held to confer no title and to be incapable of regularising unauthorised construction; right-to-livelihood plea rejected. Only the unauthorised structures, not the land, to be removed.