Government can not acquire land for Private Parties on the name of Urgency and deprive a person of his land in an arbitrary manner Supreme Court

Government can not acquire land for Private Parties on the
name of Urgency and deprive a person of his land in an arbitrary
manner Supreme Court

Government cannot deprive a person of his land in an arbitrary manner. Supreme Court says Right to Property is a Constitutional Right



Government can not acquire land for Private Parties on the name of Urgency and deprive a person of his land in an arbitrary manner Supreme Court

In March 2008 State government of Utter Pradesh acquired 205 hectares of agricultural land in Uttar Pradesh's Gautam Budh Nagar on behalf of the Greater NOIDA Industrial Development Authority for business entrepreneurs

The land owners Radhy Shyam and others had challenged the acquisition on the ground that the government invoked Section Section 17(1) and 17(4) of the Land Acquisition Act empowering it to dispense with the process of inviting objections from the victims as mandated under Section 5A of the legislation.

The high court had dismissed the land owners' plea, after which they appealed in the Supreme Court.

Supreme Court of India said that if land is acquired for the benefit of private persons, the court should view the invoking of Section 17(1) and/or 17(4) with suspicion and carefully scrutinize the relevant record before adjudicating upon the legality of such acquisition.

The court also said that "In our view, the above noted factors do not furnish legally acceptable justification for the exercise of power by the state government under Section 17(1) because the acquisition is primarily meant to cater private interest in the name of industrial development of the district,"

A Supreme Court Bench of justices G S Singhvi and A K Ganguly said in a judgement that courts should view with "suspicion" the action of the government in acquiring land for private parties in the name of urgency.

"Court should not adopt a pedantic approach, as has been done in the present case, and decide the matter keeping in view the constitutional goals of social and economic justice and the fact that even though the right to property is no longer a fundamental right, the same continues to be an important constitutional right and in terms of Article 300-A, no person can be deprived of his property except by authority of law," Justice Singhvi, writing the judgement, said.

Bench also said that on account of largescale acquisition of private agricultural land, those engaged in agricultural operations and other ancillary activities in rural areas have been deprived of the only source of their livelihood.

"A majority of them do not have any idea about their constitutional and legal rights, which can be enforced by availing the constitutional remedies.
They reconcile with deprivation of land by accepting the amount of compensation offered by the government and by thinking that it is their fate and destiny determined by God."

The Supreme Court passed the judgement while quashing the acquisition of 205 hectares of agricultural land in Uttar Pradesh's Gautam Budh Nagar by the state on behalf of the Greater NOIDA Industrial Development Authority for business entrepreneurs in March 2008.

Supreme Court Bench also added that the property of a citizen cannot be acquired by the state and/or its agencies/instrumentalities without complying with the mandate of Sections 4, 5-A and 6 of the Act.

Reality Views by sm-
Monday, April 18, 2011

Keywords Tags – Right to Property Constitutional Right, Government can not take land for the private benefit