Summary
For village land acquired in 2005-06, Greater Noida paid a higher rate and later ex gratia of Rs. 310 per square metre only to 'Pushtaini' landholders who held land before the authority's creation on 28.01.1991, denying it to later purchasers termed 'Gair-Pushtaini'; a Full Bench of the Allahabad High Court upheld the classification. The Supreme Court allowed the appeals: accepting compensation by agreement under the 1997 Rules did not waive the challenge because the ex gratia came later; the classification rested on an unproven assumption that only ancestral holders lived off the land, failed the reasonable classification, Wednesbury and proportionality tests, had no footing in the Land Acquisition Act, 1894, and offended Nagpur Improvement Trust; with the classification severed, the enhanced compensation and ex gratia go to all landowners.
Issues
- Whether landholders who accepted compensation by agreement under the U.P. Land Acquisition (Determination of Compensation and Declaration of Award by Agreement) Rules, 1997 waived their right to challenge additional compensation later granted only to others.
- Whether the classification between 'Pushtaini' and 'Gair-Pushtaini' landholders for differential compensation and ex gratia violates Article 14 of the Constitution and the law laid down in Nagpur Improvement Trust v. Vithal Rao.
Provisions considered
- Article 14, Constitution of IndiaApplying Anwar Ali Sarkar, R.C. Cooper and Navtej Singh Johar, a classification needs an intelligible differentia with rational nexus to a lawful object; the authority produced no empirical data for its assumption that only Pushtaini holders reside on or live off the land, and the effect of excluding Gair-Pushtaini holders who do so defeats the rehabilitation object. The classification also fails Wednesbury review (Om Kumar), being contrary to law, ignoring relevant factors and resting on an irrelevant cut-off date, and all five prongs of proportionality in Puttaswamy and Gujarat Mazdoor Sabha, with no safeguards against abuse. (¶¶ 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 38, 39, 40, 44, 45, 48, 50, 51, 52, 55, 56, 57)
- Sections 18 and 23, Land Acquisition Act, 1894The alternative remedy of a reference under Section 18 does not bar a writ founded on Article 14; Section 23, fifthly, already provides for the expense of changing residence or place of business, so rehabilitation compensation must be given within that provision and not by an extra-statutory classification; the Act provides compensation uniformly to all classes of owners and an administrative classification must be legitimised by the parent statute. (¶¶ 25, 26, 53, 54, 55, 60, 61, 62, 65)
- Rule 4(2), U.P. Land Acquisition (Determination of Compensation and Declaration of Award by Agreement) Rules, 1997The appellants' agreement of 15.07.2006 fixed compensation at Rs. 280 per square yard against Rs. 322 for Pushtaini holders; the ex gratia of Rs. 310 per square metre was assessed and approved on 15.01.2009, after the agreement, so no cause of action existed at signing and no waiver arose. (¶¶ 13, 16, 17, 18, 27, 28, 29, 30)
Held
- The appellants did not forfeit the right to seek revised compensation by signing the agreement: identically placed landholders who signed similar agreements were later given additional compensation by carving out an artificial class, the discrimination did not exist when the agreement was made, and no one can be expected to predict a future violation of rights and appeal pre-emptively. (¶¶ 26, 27, 28, 29, 30)
- Though the object of rehabilitating original residents likely to become landless appears reasonable, the authority and the High Court assumed without evidence that only Pushtaini holders permanently reside on or depend on the land; mere statements cannot justify a classification with debilitating effect on those on its losing side, the court cannot undertake a fact-finding mission, and a cut-off date by itself does not indicate who is most adversely affected, so the classification is struck down as violative of Article 14. (¶¶ 37, 38, 39, 40, 44, 45, 57)
- Following Nagpur Improvement Trust, where land is compulsorily acquired for a public purpose the object is equally achieved whatever the type of owner, so compensation cannot differ by the nature of the owner; permitting such classification could let powerful sections secure larger compensation than the marginalised. Since the parent statute supports rehabilitation compensation, only the arbitrary classification is severed and the remaining executive actions survive, with the ex gratia and increased base amount payable to all landowners in the subject area; differentiation between classes of persons must be backed by empirical data. (¶¶ 58, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65)
Result
Civil Appeal Nos. 8819, 8820 and 8821 of 2022 allowed without costs; Full Bench judgment of the Allahabad High Court dated 30.03.2018 set aside; the appellants' writ petition allowed and they are held entitled to the reliefs claimed, the ex gratia payment and increased base compensation to be extended to all landowners in the subject area.