The controversy over the privatisation of Agara Lake is far from over. On September 10, 2018, the Karnataka High Court admitted an appeal by the Lake Development Authority (LDA) against Biota Natural System (India) Pvt. Ltd who won the case over lake ownership against the LDA in a city civil court in January 2017. Biota is claiming that the LDA wrongfully terminated its 15-year lease agreement to manage the lake. However, the Karnataka High Court admitted the opposing plea filed by the LDA in April 2018, and has stayed the execution of the earlier city civil court order until the next hearing on November 5, 2018 (Karnataka High Court case number: MFA 3392/2018).
The residents consider this a positive development because with the redevelopment of Agara Lake at a cost of Rs 16 crore by the state government, the case has never been stronger. The Agara Lake Protection & Management Society (ALPMS) has approached the forest department that is now in charge of the lake to make a strong case in their favour. “The LDA was treating the high court case lightly, but when we informed the Forest department about it and also met chief secretary Vijaya Bhaskar (an HSR resident) and Sandeep Dave, the additional chief secretary of Forests, a strong case is now being built up for the November hearing,” says Kavitha Reddy of ALPMS.
SOME BACKGROUND OF THE CASE
In 2017, the LDA lost the case to Biota, a Hyderabad-based company, because the state advocate failed to make a strong case. In 2012, a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) was filed by Bangalore-based Environment Support Group (ESG) in the Karnataka High Court against the Karnataka government’s decision to hand over four lakes in Bangalore to private parties. The case was won, but only partially. While the PPP (Public Private Partnership) model of Agara Lake was scrapped by the court, status quo was maintained for the other three lakes – Hebbal Lake, Vengayyana Lake (KR Puram) and Nagavara Lake (Lumbini Gardens). The SC hearing on these lakes is to come up in the next few months.
Based on the High Court order, the LDA scrapped its deal with Biota citing violation of the agreement rules. When Biota lost the case in 2012, they filed a case in the city civil court to get the money they had deposited (Rs 20 lakh) with LDA with interest. As the argument by the LDA lawyer was weak, the government ended up losing the case to Biota in January 2017. Now the LDA has filed its objection at a higher court – the Karnataka High Court – against the judgement of the lower court.
THE HISTORY
Way back in May 2007, Agara Lake was handed over to Biota in a public-private partnership – the private party wanted to build an amusement park. Outraged, the residents went to court in 2008 with the help of Environment Support Group’s Public Interest Litigation and had the agreement quashed in 2009. This led to the handing over of the lake back to the Lake Development Authority. But the private party went to court saying that they got the contract first and went in for an arbitration. Last year, the government lost the case because the advocate did not make a strong case. So the lake was supposed to be handed back to the private company for its upkeep and maintenance for the next 15 years. When the LDA was trying to get a stay in High Court, the LDA was shutdown as the lake governance was given to the Minor Irrigation Department. Now, it’s being run by the Forest Department who will plead in the High Court on behalf of the LDA.
