SC imposes Rs 10 lakh fine on litigant

New Delhi, Feb 2 (PTI) The Supreme Court has imposed a Rs10 lakh fine on a land owner for repeatedly approachingcourts to scuttle acquisition of land by Karnataka governmentfor the Rs 2,500 crore Bangalore-Mysore InfrastructureCorridor Project (BMICP).

A bench of justices G S Singhvi and A K Ganguly said in ajudgement that repeated attempts by the petitioner MNagabhushana, who claims to be the owner of a part of the landlocated at Thotadaguddadahalli village, Bangalore North Taluk,was an attempt to abuse the process of law.

The ambitious project envisages creation of fivesatellite townships by a private developer at a cost of overRs 2,500 crore.

Though the project was accorded green signal by the apexcourt in 2006, it is yet to be completed owing to a series oflitigation by aggrieved land losers and PILs by certainpersons alleging that the promoter had been given tracts ofover 5,000 acres of excess land by the government,which is strongly denied by the latter.

Nagabhushana''s earlier appeal in the apex courtchallenging the acquisition proceedings by the stategovernment was dismissed by the apex court in 2004.