TULASHIRAM NIVARUTTHI Vs. TALUKA LEGAL SERVICES AUTHORITY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Rule. Learned AGP appearing for the respondent Nos. 2 to 5 waives service. Respondent No. 1 is the Taluka Legal Services Authority. The Respondent No. 6 is the learned Judge before whom the Reference Applications were pending. The Respondent No. 1 and 6 are formal parties and notice to them is not necessary. Considering the controversy involved, the petitions are forthwith taken up for final disposal. The petitioners are the claimants in the Reference Applications under Section 18 of the Land Acquisition Act, 1894 (hereinafter referred to as "the said Act"). Notification under Section 4(1) of the said Act was published on 7th October, 1999. The acquisition was for construction of Ujani Canal. Awards under Section 11 of the said Act were made on 28th February, 2003. Market value offered by the said awards was at the rate of Rs. 50.000/- per Hectare. As the petitioners did not accept the awards, at their instance, References under Section 18 of the said Act were made. The references were pending in the District Court. By consent of the parties, the References were placed before the Maha Lok Adalat held on 20th September, 2011. Settlement was arrived at before the Lok Adalat. The undisputed terms of the settlement arrived at were recorded in the consent awards. On page 22 of the Writ Petition No. 8891 of 2012, the terms of the settlement which are common in all the References have been incorporated. In our order dated 9th January, 2013 we have recorded that prima facie there does not appear any dispute regarding the terms compromise such as the market value fixed, the quantum of interest payable and the payment of other statutory benefits. We have also recorded that the only dispute is regarding the quantum of amount payable as per the compromise arrived at between the parties. In our order dated 9th January, 2013, we noted that either the Special Land Acquisition Officer will have to be directed to make correct calculation or the Reference Court will have directed to calculate the amount of compensation payable in terms of the compromise. Today, learned AGP states that she has not received any instructions.

(2.) As we have noted earlier, the compromise was made on 20th September, 2011. The terms of the compromise recorded in writing have not been disputed by the State Government till today. Therefore, this Court can safely proceed on the footing that there is no dispute about the terms of the settlement which was arrived at before the Lok Adalat and which have been incorporated in the consent award.

(3.) The allegation in the petitions is that after the terms and conditions of the settlement were agreed upon, the signatures of the petitioners were obtained on blank forms after incorporating therein the terms of settlement and a sheet for incorporating the calculations in terms of the settlement was kept blank. It is alleged that on that day, before the Lok Adalat, calculation of the amount payable in terms of compromise was made only in one reference. It is alleged that in case of other references, the calculations were incorporated subsequently which are completely erroneous. The learned counsel appearing for the petitioner states that the only anxiety of the petitioners is that they must get the compensation as per the agreement arrived at before the Lok Adalat. There are very serious allegations made in the petitions regarding the manner in which compromise was recorded in the Lok Adalat. The learned counsel for the petitioners has taken a very fair stand, and therefore, we are not going into the said allegations.