Supreme Court Clarifies Its Encroachment Removal Direction In Zudpi Jungle Land Case

The Supreme Court has issued a clarification on direction pertaining to removal of encroachment issued in its earlier judgment in Re: Zudpi Jungle Lands

The Court was considering an Interim Application seeking modification of the judgment and final order dated May 22, 2025 on use of Zudpi Jungle Land.

The division bench of CJI BR Gavai and Justice Augustine George Masih observed, "(x-a) We, however, clarify that the directions made in paragraph (x) would not be applicable to the encroachments made prior to 12th December 1996 for the purposes of agriculture, kuccha houses, pakka houses, slums, govt. employees colonies, govt. or Z.P. Schools, private schools and other public utilities to the extent of 10365.049 hectares, as has been observed in the report of the CEC. Insofar as any encroachment which has been made after 12th December 1996, if the State Government desires to regularize the same, the same shall be done only in accordance with the provisions of clauses (ii) to (vi) of paragraph 138 of this judgment.”

It was prayed in the Application that the Direction in para 138(vii) may be modified to the extent that ‘Fragmented Land Parcels’ instead of being declared as protected forest each having an area of less than 3 hectares and not adjoining any forest area may be used for the purposes referred to in Section 3(2) in Forests Rights Act, 2006 or other public uses required by the concerned village, Goathan etc.

The Court stressed that if the State desires to use any of the fragmented land parcels, which it has directed to be declared as protected forest, the State can always take recourse to the provisions of sub-Section (2) of Section 3 of the said Act.

It was further prayed that the Direction in para 138(x) may be modified to the extent that the encroachments which are in use for the purposes of agriculture, kuccha houses, pakka houses, slums, govt. employee colonies, govt. or Z.P. Schools, private schools to the extent of 10365.049 hectares may kindly be saved in the manner provided under para 138(ii) of the present judgment.

With respect to it, the Court stated that a perusal of the judgment and order dated 22nd May 2025 would reveal that one of the main reasons why we were inclined to grant a one time exemption was that over the years and on account of apathy of revenue officials, the necessary revenue entries could not be made.

"For a long period of time, the land under consideration has been used for the purpose of agriculture, kuccha houses, pakka houses, slums, Govt. employees colonies, Govt. or Z.P. Schools, private schools and other public utilities....The Central Empowered Committee (CEC) in its report itself had recommended the protection of such structures to the extent of 10,365.049 hectares......In that view of the matter, we are inclined to allow prayer clause (i)(b)", the Court observed.

The Application was accordingly disposed of.

Cause Title: In Re: Zudpi Jungle Lands (Neutral Citation: 2025 INSC 1054)

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