Preserving the Shivalik Foothills: Punjab & Haryana High Court Halts Development Activities Amidst Forest Demarcation Delay
On 22 July 2026, the Punjab and Haryana High Court passed an important interim order in a batch of Public Interest Litigations and a writ petition (led by Sukhraj Kaur Chahal v. State of Punjab). The case concerned the protection of environmentally fragile land in Village Karoran and nearby villages of District Mohali, situated in the foothills of the Shivalik Hills, approximately eight kilometres from Chandigarh. The order is a useful example of how courts seek to balance environmental protection with the property rights of ordinary citizens.
The dispute has a long history. In 2004, a newspaper reported that a country club was operating on what appeared to be forest land in Village Karoran. The High Court took suo motu (on its own motion) notice of the matter. Relying on the Punjab Land Preservation Act, 1900 (PLP Act) and the landmark Supreme Court decision in T. N. Godavarman v. Union of India, the Court held that the entire village land, roughly 3,700 acres, was "forest land" and directed its restoration.
The club owner appealed (B. S. Sandhu v. Government of India 2014), and the Supreme Court set aside the High Court's finding. This reasoning is central to the case. The Court explained that merely notifying land under the PLP Act, 1900 does not automatically make it "forest land." Such land "may or may not" be forest land. The correct test is whether the land was actually recorded as forest land on 25 October 1980, the date the Forest (Conservation) Act, 1980 came into force. Because the earlier finding affected the property rights of many villagers, farmers, and shopkeepers protected under Article 300-A of the Constitution, the Supreme Court asked the State of Punjab to carry out a careful, record-based demarcation of genuine forest land.
The present petitions raised a simple but serious grievance: despite the Supreme Court's clear direction in 2014, the State of Punjab never actually demarcated the forest land. More than a decade had passed. The petitioners alleged that the failure was not innocent. They claimed that some restaurants were shut down while large commercial constructions were allowed to flourish, and that certain senior officials had acquired valuable farmland close to Chandigarh. The High Court noted that the State had filed affidavits but had not shown any real demarcation exercise, observing that filing affidavits without doing the actual work carries no legal weight .
Because the records prima facie show sixteen villages, including Karoran, Nada, Siswan, and others, as forest land, the Court passed protective interim directions. It restrained all construction and development activity in these villages. It barred any transfer or alienation of land, including through General or Special Power of Attorney, warning that violations would be treated as contempt. The Chief Secretary was directed to form a team of Forest and Revenue Officers, headed by the Chief Conservator of Forests, to identify the true forest land as it existed in 1980, within six weeks. Copies of revenue records were to be handed to the Court's Registrar General for safe custody, and no new mutation entries were to be made during this period. The matter was listed again for 14 September 2026.
This order demonstrates the judiciary’s powers to prevent irreversible environmental damage while a proper legal determination is pending. It also reflects the Court's concern about possible manipulation of revenue records. The final answer on which land is truly "forest" still depends on the honest demarcation the Supreme Court ordered years ago.
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