BASTYAN JAO PATIL Vs. SPECIAL LAND ACQUISITION OFFICER

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is a petition challenging the proceedings taken for acquisition of the lands of the petitioner. The lauds under acquisition are survey Nos. 34, H. No. 1, S, No. 35, H. No. 5, S. No. 35, II. No. 8 and portions of survey Nos. 53 and 52 in all admeasuring 8 acres and 21 gunthas situated at Panch Pakhadi in Taluka and District Thana. The circumstances which led to the filing of the petition are briefly stated as follows: - A Notification under Section 4 of the Land Acquisition Act was issued on July 9, 1960 and published in the Government Gazette on July 21, 1960 with a view to acquiring land for a company, M/s. Voltas Limited. That notification was not on the record but we have allowed the petitioner to present a copy thereof in the course of the arguments before us. Objections were invited, under Section 5A, on July 25, 1960 and filed by the petitioner, on August 30, 1960. The petitioner was then heard and was himself present. This was on October 17, 1960. According to the notification the lands specified in the schedule were likely to be needed for the purposes of the company viz. for factory buildings. Since the acquisition was for a company an agreement as required by Section 39 of the Land Acquisition Act was to be entered into and such an agreement between the company and the Government was entered into on February 3, 1961. Thereafter a notification was issued under Section 6 on March 24, 1961 followed by a notification under Section 9 issued on April 11, 1961. The petitioner put in his claim for compensation on August 2, 1961 and an award was made on September 8, 1962. By the award the compensation for the petitioner's land was assessed at Rs. 76,968.27 paise. The compensation assessed was not acceptable to the petitioner and so he asked for a reference under Section 18 of the Act. The reference was, asked for by the petitioner on October 11, 1962, but actually no reference came to be made because other events transpired in the meanwhile.

(2.) BEFORE the award was made in the present case the decision of the Supreme Court in R. L. Arora v. State of Uttar Pradesh was declared on December 15, 1961. This case has been referred to in the arguments as the first Arora case, (there is also a second case of the same party which arose before the Supreme Court to which we shall presently refer), and we shall, therefore, refer to it also as such. The decision in the first Arora case placed a certain interpretation on the provisions of Section 40(1)(&) and Section 41(5) of the Land Acquisition Act reversing a decision of the Allahabad High Court. The view taken in that case was that in interpreting the words of Section 40(1)(i) the Court must take into account the 5th sub -clause of Section 41 and the two must be read together. So reading those provisions the Supreme Court held What the provisions of sections 40 and 41 require is that the work should be directly useful to the public and the agreement shall contain a terra how the public shall have the right to use the work directly themselves'. At page 771 of the Report, para. 14, the Supreme Court observed, '...Government has to take an agreement from the company, and that agreement must provide, where acquisition is needed for the construction of some work and that work is likely to prove useful to the public, the terms on which the public shall be entitled to use the work. These words can only mean that the public should have a right to use the work itself and not the product of it; and it is the duty of the Government when it takes an agreement under Section 41 to see that the public is so entitled to use the work. To say that the public is entitled to use the work because the public can go to the work in the way of business is in our opinion not giving any right to the public to use the work directly as such. This important decision affected a large number of notices issued for acquisitions including the notice in the present proceedings. Upon the view taken in the first Arora case obviously the notification issued under Section 6 on March 24, 1961 could not have been upheld as valid.

(3.) ON July 14, 1964 the present petition was filed in this Court and during its pendency on August 11, 1965 Government issued a notification under Section 6 of the Land Acquisition Act. It was stated before us by counsel for respondents that this fresh notification was issued because the previous notification under Section 6 was bad in view of the first Arora, case and it must be ignored. This new notification, it is not disputed, is not with reference to any of the petitioner's lands, but is directed against properties of other persons found mentioned in the original notification under Section 4 published on July 21, 1960. This notification of August 11, 1965, it has been urged on behalf of the petitioner, now precludes Government from issuing any other notification under that section upon the ground that the notification under Section 4 has in consequence of the issue of the notification under Section 6 exhausted itself.