DHARAMPAL SINGH Vs. A K BANERJI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioners in this writ application claim to be owners of land bearing plot Nos. 54 and 56 situated in village Lachhu Chak, Police Station Kharagpur, district Monghyr. On the first occasion the Additional Collector of Monghyr (respondent No. 1) had issued a notification under Section 4(i) of the Land Acquisition Act, 1894 (Central Act I of 1894), hereinafter called "the Act", as the said section stood amended by the Land Acquisition (Bihar Amendment) Act, 1960 (Bihar Act 11 of 1961). A copy of this notification dated the 9th of June, 1967 is Annexure '1' to the writ application. The State Government had decided by an order made on the 24th of May, 1967, under Section 17(4) of the Act, as it stands under the Bihar Amendment, to dispense with the provisions contained in Section 5-A of the Act. The declaration thereafter was issued by respondent No. 1 on the 5th of September, 1967, which was published on the 13th of November. 1967, under Section 6 of the Act, a copy of which is Annexure '1A'. The petitioners challenged the validity of the said notifications in C.W.J.C No. 753 of 1968. Several points were raised in this writ case but the notifications were quashed only on one point that publication and service of the notification issued tinder Section 4(1) of the Act was not made in accordance with the requirements of the said provision of law as amended by Bihar Act 11 of 1961. No other point was decided in the judgment in that case which was delivered on the 26th of February, 1969.

(2.) After the decision in C.W.J.C, No. 753 of 1968, respondent No. 1 has issued a fresh notification dated the 1st of July, 1969, under Section 4 of the Act Referring to the decision of the Government as to the urgency of the scheme taken in May, 1967 the provisions of Section 5-A of the Act have been dispensed with and a declaration under Section 6 of the Act has been made on the 9th of July, 1969. The notification as also the declaration were published in the Bihar Gazette dated the 23rd of July, 1969. It is claimed that publication in other manners had also been made. The petitioners are now challenging the validity of the notification under Section 4 of the Act, a copy of which is Annexure '2', and the declaration under Section 6 of the Act, a copy of which has been filed as Annexure '5' with the supplementary petition filed by the petitioners on the 24th of February, 1970. Again the petitioners have raised several points for the quashing of the two annexures aforesaid namely, 2 and 5, and, since they have got to be quashed for the reasons to be stated hereafter on two points, a fresh notification will have to be issued by the appropriate authorities. If the other points are left undecided, the petitioners will raise them again. To avoid this contingency, full arguments were addressed to us by Mr. B.C. Ghose, learned Advocate appearing for the petitioners, and Mr. K.P. Varma, Government Advocate, on behalf of the State of Bihar (respondent No. 2). It is necessary and expedient to decide all the points one way or the other raised before us in this writ case. I, therefore, proceed to state and discuss the points one by one and decide them for the disposal of this writ application.

(3.) The first point raised on behalf of the petitioners is that the public purpose mentioned in Annexure '2' is different from that mentioned in Annexure '1' in that in the latter the purpose mentioned was construction of bundh and nala while in Annexure '2' the purpose mentioned was for protection of the two existing bundhs. In my opinion, there is no substance in this argument. The purpose is not very differently mentioned in Annexure '2' from the one mentioned in Annexure 1. Even assuming it to be so, it is for the authorities to decide as to what was the existing public purpose when the fresh notification under Section 4 was made in July 1959. It is, however, hoped that when another notification would be issued after the impugned ones in this case have been quashed the public purpose for which the land is sought to be acquired would be mentioned with consistency certainty and precision as far as possible.