SPECIAL LAND ACQUISITION OFFICER (6), BOMBAY AND BOMBAY SUBURBAN DISTRICT Vs. TAYEBJEE ABDULHUSSEIN RESHAMWALLA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an application by the claimant in the Land Acquisition Reference praying that even though he has not made any claim before the Land Acquisition Officer, he should be permitted to proceed with the reference and claim enhanced compensation against the award made by the Special Land Acquisition Officer. The claimant justifies his want of filing his claim before the Special Land Acquisition Officer on the ground that, as far as he could remember, no notice under section 9 (3) and (4) in respect of the land under acquisition was served on him. The claimant further states that on taking inspection of the file of the Special Land Acquisition Officer, he found that although the notice under section 9(3) and (4) dated Dec. 19, 1963 was issued in his name, it was not known to him as to what address it was despatched. He further states that the signature on the copy of the notice in the file of the Special Land Acquisition Officer as of the person having received the said notice on Jan. 8, 1964 was not his signature nor was it the signature of any person in his family or any person residing with him. He submits that thus the notice under section 9 (3) and (4) was not at all served on him and, therefore, he could not file any claim as required under the Land Acquisition Act before the Special Land Acquisition Officer (hereinafter referred to as "SLAO"). He further says that after he received the notice of the award under section 12(2) on or about June 4, 1966 he made an application on June 30, 1966 to the SLAO for reference to this Court under section 18 of the Act. These are the statements made by the claimant in his affidavit dated June 29, 1973 justifying the omission to file a claim under section 9(3) and (4) of the Land Acquisition Act (hereinafter referred to as "the Act"). To this affidavit, there is an affidavit in reply by Smt. Vasudha Yeshwant Kalke, Aval Karkun in the Office of the SLAO (6). Referring to the relevant portions of the affidavit of the claimant, in reply she states as follows :

(2.) Before I go to the submissions made by Mr. Vaidya before me, on behalf of the claimant, I would like to state certain facts. Notification under section 4 of the Act was issued on March 2, 1961. On Aug. 29, 1961 appearance by advocate A. V. Patel was filed on behalf of the claimant. Notice under section 9(3) was issued and was served upon Mr. A.V. Patel on Jan. 8, 1964. The award was served on June 4, 1966 and an application for reference under section 18 was made by the claimant on June 30, 1966.

(3.) It was contended by Mr. Vaidya for the claimant at one stage that the advocate, Mr. A.V. Patel was not the authorised representative of the claimant inasmuch as Vakalatnama in favour of Mr. A. V. Patel was not signed by him but was signed by his son. However, before he proceeded to argue this application, he made the following statement before me: