Held, if no orders of rejection are passed on an application for permission / license, including a defective one, within the statutory period contemplated under S.233(3) of the Act, then by virtue of the provisions of S.236(3), the permission sought for, is to be deemed as granted – Only recourse available to Panchayat thereafter, would be to initiate proceedings for cancellation of the said deemed permission, in the event of their noticing any contravention in conditions of the permission or violation of statutory provisions – Intimation of defect within the statutory period, by the Panchayat, is not sufficient to avoid the deeming provision

The petitioner had submitted an application dated 25/04/2017 for installation of machinery in the building. The said application was rejected by the Panchayat. In appeal thereagainst, the Tribunal for Local Self Government Institutions, confirmed the decision of Panchayat on account of certain technical irregularities noticed in the application. Petitioner thereafter submitted a fresh application on 21/03/2018 without curing the defects noticed by the Tribunal. On 07/05/2018, the Panchayat intimated that his fresh application also continued to be defective in the manner indicated by the Tribunal's appellate order. However, the Panchayat did not reject that application, but kept the matter pending. Hence, the petitioner filed the writ petition for granting a deemed permit.

Allowing the writ petition, the Court held:

While it may be a fact that the application submitted by the petitioner was inherently defective, it is also a fact that the respondent Panchayath, which could have rejected the said application of the petitioner on that ground, did not choose to do so, and thereby kept the application alive beyond the statutory period contemplated under the Panchayat Raj Act for attracting the deeming provision. The decisions of this Court in Rajesh Ramachandran v. Corporation of Trivandrum, 2008 (3) KHC 175 : 2008 (3) KLT 419, which was affirmed by a Division Bench in Sudhakaran v. Pallichal Grama Panchayat, 2016 (2) KHC 481 : 2016 (2) KLT 175 would clearly indicate that if no orders of rejection are passed on an application for permission / license, including a defective one, within the statutory period contemplated under the Act, then by virtue of the provisions of S.236(3), the permission sought for is to be deemed granted and the only recourse available to the respondent Panchayat thereafter, would be to initiate proceedings against the petitioner for a cancellation of the said deemed permission in the event of their noticing that the activities of the petitioner are being carried on in contravention of the conditions of the permission or in violation of the statutory provisions.