VALAVALA LAKSHMINARASAMMA Vs. ASSISTANT COMMISSIONER OF LABOUR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a case under the Land Acquisition Act on appeal from the Acting District Judge of Rajahmundry. The land acquired is 1 acre 77 cents in Survey No. 78, an inam dry land in the village of Tottaramudi in Amalapur Taluk. The claimant has been allowed Rs. 500 an acre plus cost of trees and allowances. Before the learned District Judge, the claimant claimed Rs. 4,500 as compensation and before us the learned Vakil has stated that he is entitled to Rs. 2,500 more than has been awarded. The claim is put on two grounds, first, that, as the surrounding lands have been acquired to extend the Settiga hamlets and that as this land has been acquired for the same purpose, we must value it as a building site. Alternatively it is said, that, as it is a cocoanut tope with a valuable annual yield of cocoanuts, it may be valued on that basis. Rupees 2,000 an acre is claimed as building site and a net sum of Rs. 3,600 as a cocoanut tope estimating the price at 20 years annual value. It is perfectly clear that the claimant cannot have it both ways: as pointed out by the learned Judges of this Court in. Shanmugha Valayuda Mudaliar v. Collector of Tanjore 93 Ind. Cas. 639 : 23 L.W. 336 : (1926) M.W.N. 235, "It is obvious that the same land cannot simultaneously be used as a cocoanut tope and for buildings."

(2.) If it is acquired for a building site, the trees will have to come down. If it is acquired for a value of the yield of the trees, the trees will of course remain standing. The learned Judge has awarded compensation on the basis first of the land as land merely, and, secondly, a sum has been awarded as the value of the cocoanut trees on it. The documentary evidence which is relied on for the claimant for the purpose of showing the value of the land is as follows:

(3.) Exhibit B which, however, relates to & very small piece of land about 3 cents which comes to about Rs. 1,500 an acre. Exhibit G is another small piece which works out at about the same sum. Exhibit D is 40 cents and works out at Rs. 1,000 an acre, Exhibit C is another small piece of 3-1/5 cents. Another, Ex. K. is an acquisition by the Taluk Board for a road of another small piece consisting of about 6,000 or 7,000 Jinks which, when worked out comes to Rs. 2,400 an acre. Mr. J. Ramiah Pantulu, who has been called for the claimant, has made purchases very close to the suit land in question under Ex. D in 1915 and under Ex. E in August 1922. Exhibit E works out at a little over Rs. 800 an acre and Ex. D at about Rs 1,000. The witness says that the price paid for the cocoanut garden will be 8 to 15 years purchase on the net income, i. e., the value of the trees. The lands in the neighbourhood fetch about 20 years purchase. The witness was of opinion that under Ex. E he paid a little over the market price. It should be pointed out that the award works out at about Rs. 1,035 an acre including the trees. The claimant has in her petition apparently Estimated the value of the property as a Cocoanut tope only because she states that the land every year yields 8,000 cocoanuts Worth Rs. 500 and that she requires Rs. 4,500 as compensation if the land is to be acquired from her. That is clearly 9 years purchase of the value of the cocoanuts and in this connection Exs. III and J were relied on her behalf. Exhibit III is an award passed about a month before the present one where land alone was taken at Rs. 500 an acre plus the cost of trees and allowances.