VALLABBHAI KABABHAI Vs. STATE OF GUJARAT

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioner challenge the acquisition of his land bearing Survey Nos. 7/1 and 66 part of village Bakshipur. The said land alongwith many other lands have been acquired for the Demi Irrigation Scheme. The followings are the contentions raised by the learned Counsel.

(2.) As regards the first contention the petitioner has averred that no award was made and published on 6th February 93 and even 8/02/1993 the award was not available. In the affidavit-in-reply it has been pointed out that the award in fact was made on 6/02/1992 after obtaining the approval of the Government on 5/02/1992. The draft award was submitted to the Government long back and the sanction was personally taken by the Land Acquisition Officer and thereupon immediately the award was declared. The averment of the petitioner that one Ramjibhai Mohanbhai had had sought the information and he was specifically informed that the award was getting ready and cannot be shown has been denied and in fact it is stated that said Ramjibhai was present when the award was declared on 6/02/1991 and that said Ramjibhai was served a notice under Section 12(2) on 6/02/1993 itself. The petitioner has not produced the affidavit of Ramjibhai Mohanbhai. It is thus clear that the award has been made on 6/02/1991 after obtaining prior approval of the State Government.

(3.) It is submitted that the award made on 6/02/1993 is beyond time and the proceeding for land acquisition lapsed under Section 11(A) of the Act which provides that the Collector shall make an award under Section 11 within a period of two years from the date of publication of the declaration and if no award is made within that period the entire proceeding of the acquisition of the land shall lapse. In the present case the award is made on 6/02/1993 and according to the respondents the publication of the declaration under Section 6 was on 7/02/1991 According to the petitioner this 7/02/1991 declaration is got up and interpolated after filing of the petition and on receipt of the notice was made returnable on 12/01/1993 and was ordered to be issued on 30 Apart from the affidavit-in-reply which shows that the declaration under Section 6 was published at the locality on 7/02/1991 we have also gone through the original record of the Land Acquisition Officer and it is found that even before the present petition was filed there is correspondence showing that Section 6 declaration was published on 7/02/1991. Therefore the say of the petitioner that interpolation and tampering of the record has been done after coming to know of the present petition is completely knocked out.