1 IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY BENCH AT AURANGABAD WRIT PETITION NO. 4954 OF 2010 Prakash S/o Baburao Dhawale, Age : 49 Years, Occu. : Agriculture, R/o Devi Nimgaon, Tq. Ashti, District Beed. .. .. Petitioner Versus 1. The State of Maharashtra, Through Secretary Revenue Department, Mantralaya, Mumbai - 32. 2. The District Collector, Beed. 3. The Special Land Acquisition Officer, Division No. 2, Beed. 4. The District Rehabilitation Officer, Beed, Dist. Beed. .. .. Respondents Shri A. R. Gaikwad, Advocate h/f Shri S. S. Thombre, Advocate for the Petitioner. Smt. A. V. Gondhalekar, A.G.P. for Respondent Nos. 1 to 4. CORAM : P. V. HARDAS AND N. D. DESHPANDE, JJ. 2 DATE : 29TH JUNE, 2010. ORAL JUDGMENT [Per P. V. HARDAS, J. ] : . Rule. Rule returnable forthwith. With the consent of learned counsel for parties, this petition is heard finally at the stage of admission. 2. By this petition, under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, the petitioner prays for quashing and setting aside the impugned communication dated 19.01.2010 declining to issue the certificate to the petitioner as project affected person. 3. Undisputedly, the land of the petitioner came to be acquired for the construction of village tank. Since the land was acquired for a public project the petitioner applied for issuance of the certificate and by the impugned order the application came to be rejected. The reason advanced by the respondent for rejecting the application of the petitioner is that no instructions had been received from the Government as to acquisition of land for a village tank constituted a project within the definition of the Act. 4. Learned counsel for the petitioner has invited our attention 3 to several judgments rendered by the Division Bench of this Court particularly in Writ Petition No. 7388/2006 Ashruba S/o Dnyanoba Andhale Vs. State of Maharashtra and others dated 16.06.2007, Writ Petition No. 4478/2007 Sow. Sangita W/o Balu Sable Vs. State of Maharashtra and others dated 15th October, 2007 and Writ Petition No. 303/2010 dated 5th February, 2010. The Division Bench in no uncertain terms had held that acquisition of land for the purpose of construction of public tank constituted acquisition of land for a project within the definition of the Act and consequently such person was entitled to be issued with the certificate. 5. We accordingly, allow this petition and quash and set aside the impugned order and direct the respondents to forthwith issue certificate to the petitioner as a project affected person. This be done within four weeks from today. 6. Rule is thus made absolute on the above terms with no order as to costs. [ N. D. DESHPANDE, J.] [ P. V. HARDAS, J.] bsb/June 10