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A welfare State does not mean that everybody should be subsidised.
Those occupying railway properties for ages and who have been getting away with rents fixed ages ago must be made to pay at the current market rates.
Observations to this effect were made by the Supreme Court in Lala Ram (Deceased) by Legal Representatives and Others vs Union of India and Another .
The appellants were a bunch of shopkeepers occupying railway properties on a measly rent of Rs 21 a sq. yard a year for ages. The Railways proposed to increase the rent to Rs 270 a sq. yard in keeping with the current market realities but with retrospective effect from 1980. Striking a balance between the claim of the appellants that it was their birthright to be charged a low rent by a State utility and the egregiousness of the Railways in hiking the rent retrospectively, the apex court allowed the hike but with prospective effect.
(The author is a New Delhi-based chartered accountant.)
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