BENGALURU: A division bench of the Karnataka High Court upheld the order passed by a single judge that had set aside the acquisition of several acres of land for the controversial Bengaluru-Mysuru Infrastructure Corridor (BMIC) project.
"It appears that this BMICP may be one of the biggest scam in the State of Karnataka and it demonstrates how a State, which is the trustee of the natural resources on behalf of the citizens, can allow the private interest to flourish in utter violation of the Constitutional mandate and the law to the detriment of environment, ecology and against the public interest for questionable considerations", the division bench observed.
A division bench of Justice D K Singh and Justice T M Nadaf made these scathing remarks in the order pronounced on Wednesday dismissing the 92 appeals filed by the Nandi Infrastructure Corridor Enterprise Limited (NICE), Karnataka Industrial Area Development Board (KIADB) and others challenging the single judge's order dated July 4, 2025.
The single judge had set aside the acquisition of several acres of land with an observation that more than 23 years have passed since the notifications were issued between 2008 and 2009 and awards have not been passed by the KIADB, depriving the owners of the use and occupation of agricultural lands and losing their livelihood.
Dismissing the appeals, the division bench observed that the NICE project has done nothing but to benefit its proponents in an astronomical way at the expense of the landowners and the public interest in general.
This is a fit case where an independent assessment and investigation should be carried out by a special team of experts by conducting a forensic audit of its accounts and for committing fraud and other criminal acts of commissions and omissions, the court added.
The court, however, said: "We have a doubt that such an exercise will ever be taken up as the State itself is accomplice in allowing the project proponents to earn huge profits illegally by diverting the lands against the Framework Agreement (FWA), capitalising the assets, drying up the lakes, collecting huge toll in violation of the FWA and sitting over the huge land bank without payment of compensation etc".
The court also observed that the facts disclosed would clearly suggest that there is nothing about the NICE project except that the farmers have been robbed of their lands and livelihood of generations without payment of compensation.
NICE, which has constructed only 5 km of expressway in the last 25-26 years, is sitting over a huge land bank of more than 20,000 acres, and the land and the assets have been alienated and capitalised to its benefit against the Supreme Court judgement and in violation of the terms of FWA, the court said.
NICE contended that the government has violated the FWA by not giving the extent of land as required under the agreement, resulting in non-completion of the project in 25 years.
However, the court said that this contention is not only false but incorrect, which is evident from the affidavit filed by the state in a contempt petition that 554 acres of excess land had been handed over to NICE.
"We fail to understand why the state is not reviewing the project or cancelling the same, as NICE has utterly failed in its objective of developing 5 townships and an expressway of around 111 kms and creating opportunities for employment and growth", the court noted.
NICE contended that permitting repeated litigations would seriously impede the implementation of public infrastructure projects, but the court did not accept it, saying the delay complained of by the landowners is not of a few months or a few years.