The petitioner, Bhagwanji Raiyani, had argued that private, residential and commercial constructions on the land at Yashodham, Goregaon (E) had been sanctioned by the government in 1983 on the understanding that the developer would construct a court building on it for the state.

However, while the developer exploited the terms of the agreement and the plot, the court buildings remained on paper. ``Sixteen years passed, nine chief ministers have changed, more than a 100 officers came and went, nothing happened,'' Raiyani pointed out.

State Advocate General C J Sawant claimed onFriday that the matter had reached a stalemate since earlier rules had made it incumbent on the developer to give 10 per cent of the constructed floor space index (FSI) to the state government. But, the Supreme Court's judgement in the Shantistar case stating that the state need get only five per cent had complicated the issue and required time to be resolved.

The developer's counsel clarified that under the new negotiations, it had been decided that five per cent of the plot would be for the court building. It was also resolved that the state government would give the developer the recent district schedule rates for constructions which had come in only in February this year with fresh plans for the building.

``If the building plans are given to us, we will construct it in a time bound programme. In any case, I have kept the plot free of encumberances all these years at my cost,'' the developer submitted.

Raiyani, however, alleged that the developer should not be paid the fresh rates because he hadalready made huge profits on the earlier agreement. The bench allowed the petitioner to file any rejoinder he wanted to the developers and the government's affidavits.