Thiruvananthapuram: Cabinet on Thursday decided to hand over the controversial Kovalam Palace (Halcyon Castle) and its 4.13 hectares of land to RP Group of NRI businessman B. Ravi Pillai. However, the government decided to retain the ownership of the palace and reserve the right to file a civil suit. The proposal to hand over the iconic building to the private owner was put forward by the tourism department. Though it had made the proposal on earlier occasions, the government could not arrive at a decision because of the opposition raised by CPI leaders.
Revenue minister E. Chandrasekharan was against any move for “unconditional transfer” of the property. The government had sought a legal opinion from Advocate General last month who advised to retain the right to its possession before handing it over. Former chief minister V.S. Achuthanandan termed the decision as “unfortunate.” “Though the government has retained the ownership for the moment, the palace could end up in the hands of a private party in future,” he cautioned. The veteran leader said that the government should have exercised the option of filing a civil suit.
The government had taken over the Halcyon Castle and surrounding land which was owned by erstwhile Travancore royal family way back in 1962. In 1970 the government handed over the palace and the land to the union tourism ministry.Subsequently ITDC’s Ashok Beach Resort functioned on this property till 2002. Later M-Far Hotels Pvt Ltd acquired possession of the palace when it bought the adjoining ITDC Kovalam Ashok Beach Resort as part of the then central government’s disinvestment process.
On Sept. 27, 2004, the state government issued an order taking over the Halcyon Castle from M-Far Hotels following which the latter filed a petition in the Kerala High Court. Later Captain Krishnan Nair of Leela Group acquired the property from M-Far group in 2005. A law Kovalam Palace (taking over by Resumption) was brought by the government to take over the property in 2005. However, the High Court rejected the order terming it anti-constitutional in 2011. The writ petition against it was also dismissed by the court. The government received a setback when the Supreme Court refused to admit Special Leave Petition filed in 2016. Meanwhile, the RP Group had filed a contempt petition for not transferring the land as per the high court verdict.
The government said it was under these circumstances that the opinion of the law department was taken. The law department and AG had opined that since SC had rejected SLP there was no possibility of going in for appeal. It was after taking into consideration all these aspects that the government decided to hand over the castle and the surrounding land. The Kovalam Palace was built by Sri Rama Varma Valiya Koil Thampuran back in 1932 as a retreat for the royal family. Thampuran sold the property to the government in 1964 and the India Tourism Development Corporation (ITDC) started running a deluxe hotel there. The central government put the property on auction in 2002.
