MUMBAI: Observing landowners had right to be heard, Bombay High Court on Tuesday quashed a 2017 acquisition of several plots of agricultural land in the village of Vahal, Panvel, for the Navi Mumbai International Airport project. A division bench of Justices M S Sonak and Jitendra Jain, in a March 4 judgment, observed that a landowner’s right to be heard against the proposed acquisition “must be meaningful and not a sham.”
Several farmers filed petitions before the HC to challenge a May 2015 notification and the 2017 acquisition of their lands, saying they would be rendered landless.
The farmers challenged the acquisition as being “vitiated” and erroneous. They said authorities dispensed with a mandatory enquiry process under the Land Acquisition Act with no real urgency cited.
No proof of urgency shown to dispense with hearing: HC
The HC held that the Maharashtra govt was not right in invoking any urgency clause to dispense with such a hearing while acquiring plots for the Navi Mumbai airport project. “Such invocation was ex-facie illegal, null and void because this was not a real urgency, or an urgency that would brook no delay of even a few days or months,” said the HC.
“It is one thing to say that the State and its instrumentality want to execute a project of public importance without loss of time, and it is altogether different to say that in the execution of such a project, private individuals should be deprived of their property without even being heard,” the HC judgment said.
The HC, however, held that the City and Industrial Development Corporation (CIDCO) Limited is not precluded from acquiring the land by following the law and lawful procedures.
“No material is produced on record to justify the alleged invocation of the urgency provisions,” said the HC after hearing senior counsel A V Anturkar with advocate Sachin Punde for the farmers, senior counsel GS Hegde with Pinky Bhansali for CIDCO, and senior counsel Atul Damle for an intervenor. The HC said, “The urgency provisions can be invoked only in grave and real urgency cases” and must be accompanied by the application of mind.
For CIDCO, Hegde submitted that after the Award was made on 7 July 2017 and the Petitioners were served notice under Section 12(2) on 4 August 2017, the farmers on 11 July 2017 applied for rehabilitation through the allotment of alternate land after deducting 20% of the compensation payable to them. He submitted that such a demand amounts to acquiescence, and hence they cannot challenge the acquisition proceedings.
The HC, however, held that the circumstance that the Petitioners applied for rehabilitation by abundant caution cannot be construed as acquiescence to a void acquisition.