The Supreme Court today asked the Punjab and Haryana High Court to adjudicate a PIL by Haryana Janhit Congress (HJC) chief Kuldeep Bishnoi seeking quashing of laws enacted by Haryana and the Centre to facilitate the setting up of Special Economic Zones (SEZs). Bishnoi had filed the PIL in the SC, but a Bench headed by Chief Justice RM Lodha said it would be better if the case was first decided by the High Court as the apex court would have the benefit of High Court’s views while hearing the appeal, if any. The SC also sent to the respective state High Courts similar PILs and other cases against SEZ projects in Karnataka, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra and other states. According to Bishnoi, Haryana had approved over 50 SEZ projects and most of these still remained non-starters and vast tracts of land acquired from farmers for these projects were being diverted to private property developers, giving rise to speculative trading in real estate at the cost of poor people, who were forced to part with their precious land. The SEZ scheme was also jeopardizing national food security and the ecology of the Aravalli Hills running through Gurgaon and other parts of Haryana, he contended. He also pleaded for the return all acquired land to the farmers. However, in response to the SC notice on the PIL filed in 2006, Haryana and the State Industrial Development Corporation (HSIDC) had contended that as many as 2,200 acres of land had been returned to the farmers as most of the SEZ projects did not take off due to lack of interest from the corporate sector. According to Haryana’s Additional Advocate General Manjit Singh Dalal, the biggest economic project, the Reliance Haryana SEZ in Sectors 36, 36-B and 37-B of Gurgaon, no longer existed “either on paper or on ground.” The state had given 1,383 acres of land for the joint venture project in the form of equity, but the scheme was de-notified in June 2013 following the surrender of land by Reliance.