Hyderabad: The Telangana High Court on Friday, May 29, held Hyderabad Disaster Response and Asset Protection Agency (HYDRAA) guilty of contempt of court for its demolitions in Kukatpally and directed it to restore the land to its previous state within 24 hours.
If the agency failed to do so, the petitioner was allowed to carry out the work, and all expenses would be extracted from HYDRAA officials’ personal funds.
The court also heavily censured HYDRAA, stating its conduct represents a recurring modus operandi of “demolish first, fence and fix boards next, and seek justification thereafter, treating the orders of the court as an inconvenience to be circumvented rather than as a command to be obeyed.”
The petitioner had pointed out that HYDRAA, through its demolition drive carried out on the 13-17 acres of land in Kukatpally village, on May 26, violated three court orders.
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One of the orders, dated February 22, 2022, had explicitly prohibited anyone from interfering with the petitioner’s possession of the subject land. The second order, from September 3, 2024, recorded a legal undertaking from HYDRAA that they would not take any sudden action against the land.
In the third order, from May 28, 2025, the court ruled that the entire land was legally regularised by the government back in 2008 for a fee of over Rs 9.27 crore. It was also established that the land was not a water body, shikam or tank.
After hearing all arguments, the court declared that the petitioner had established a strong prima facie case of “willful disobedience and broken undertakings”, adding that leaving the damage unchecked would cause grave and irreparable injury to the petitioner.
The case has been posted for further hearing on June 4. HYDRAA has said that it will file an appeal in the case.
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