GOVERNMENT OF BOMBAY Vs. NHMOOS

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an appeal from the decision of Mr. Justice Kajiji in Land Acquisition Reference No. 8 of 1920. The land in reference was notified for acquisition on the 16 May 1916, it admeasured 3521-4/9 square yards, and was situated on the Golangi Hill. The photograph of the model at p. 11, Part III, gives us the best idea of the land and its surroundings. Before the Collector it was valued on what I may call a quarrying basis, that is to say, the total cubic contents of stone and Moorum were calculated and a particular value was given to them, written back according to the period estimated to be taken up for quarrying. Nothing was allowed for the land after the quarrying was finished. The total value arrived at by this method was for all interests Rs. 26,454.88. As the land is Toka the amount of the Government interest was deducted. Then to what was left was added fifteen per cent, for compulsory acquisition plus Rs. 500 for compensation for severance awarded to the appellant. The total for all the claim was Rs. 21,744.

(2.) The learned Judge after considering all the evidence before him with regard to the basis of valuation, came to the conclusion that if all the materials that were placed before him had been placed before the Land Acquisition Officer, the Land Acquisition Officer would not have valued the land on the quarrying basis. But the learned Judge thought; himself bound to hold that the land should be valued on the quarrying basis because that was the basis which was followed according to the evidence on both sides before the Land Acquisition Officer. We think the learned Judge was wrong in valuing the land on the quarrying basis when on the evidence before him he was of opinion that the land could not be used as a quarry. Even then on the evidence the learned Judge valuing the land on the basis that it would be used as a quarry valued all interests at Rs. 41,611, but valued the Government interest on a different basis to that on which it had been valued by the Collector, with the result that the amount awarded to the claimant was Rs, 37,365 plus Rs. 5,604-12-0, fifteen per cent, for compulsory acquisition.

(3.) Two questions arise: (1) what was the proper market value of all interests in the land to be acquired? and (2) what should be deducted for the value of the Government interest as the land was held on Toka tenure? It seems to have been admitted, at any rate for the purposes of argument before us, that the land would be worth in the market Rs. 7-8-0 a square yard if it was used for building purposes. There is no evidence whatever that a purchaser would have offered more than Rs. 7-8-0 a square yard for this land. No evidence was called on either side of any purchases of the land in the neighbourhood, and we have to rely mainly on expert evidence as to what a purchaser would be likely to give for this land. No doubt one is entitled to consider that a purchaser looking at the land, and wanting to buy it, would take into consideration the fact that it rises in places to a height of about eighty feet above the ordinary level, and that if he did not wish to build on the surface, he could get some value out of the Moorum and stone beneath the surface. But all those calculations of the value of the cubic contents of the land above the ordinary level plus the deferred value of the land on the level when the material above it has been removed, appear to me to afford very little assistance to a Court in arriving as to what should be the market value of the land at the date of the notification because no evidence has been adduced from which the Court could hold that a purchaser would enter into all those elaborate calculations and base his offer for the land on the certainty that they would be realised. In all my experience I have never come across a purchaser who said he made hypothetical calculations of this character before he purchased; they are used by experts to justify an opinion which is as a rule equally valuable and less assailable without them; and the general fallacy underlying all these hypothetical calculations is this, that they result in the total profit a purchaser may expect on the most favourable estimates, which is a different thing from what a purchaser would give on an estimation of the profit which he would be likely to make, taking all risks into consideration.