*HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE C.V. NAGARJUNA REDDY +W.P.No.5926 of 2007 % 27-6-2011 # C.Padmavathi .. Petitioner And $ The District Collector, Chittoor District, Chittoor and others .. Respondents <GIST: >HEAD NOTE: ! Counsel for petitioner : Ms.Bobba Vijaya Lakshmi ^ Counsel for respondents : G.P. for Land Acquisition ? CASES REFERRED: 1. 2008(2) ALT 136 2. 2008(5) ALT 233 3. AIR 2009 A.P. 15 4. 2011(5) SCC 553 HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE C.V. NAGARJUNA REDDY W.P.No.5926 of 2007 Date : 27-6-2011 Between : C.Padmavathi .. Petitioner And The District Collector, Chittoor District, Chittoor and others .. Respondents Counsel for petitioner : Ms.Bobba Vijaya Lakshmi Counsel for respondents : G.P. for Land Acquisition The Court made the following: ORDER: This Writ Petition is filed for a mandamus to declare notification dated 1-2-2007 issued under Section 4(1) of the Land Acquisition Act, 1894 (for short "the Act") to the extent of the petitioner’s land admeasuring Ac.10-20 cents in Sy.No.339-A of Padipeta, Thirupathi Rural Mandal, Chittoor District, as illegal and arbitrary. The petitioner has filed, with the permission of this court, amendment petition by including the prayer that the proposed acquisition without conversion of the land for non- agricultural purposes under the provisions of A.P. Agricultural Land (Conversion for Non-agricultural Purposes) Act 2006, (for short "the Act"), is illegal. It requires to be noted that the issue raised based on the amended prayer needs to be rejected as the said issue is no longer res integra in view of the Judgment of this court i n R.Veera Raghava Prasad and others Vs. District Collector, Krishna District at Machilipatnam and another[1] wherein this court rejected an identical plea. This has however left the court with the only other point raised by the learned counsel Smt.Bobba Vijaya Lakshmi, appearing for the petitioner, namely, that the purpose mentioned in the impugned notification i.e., provision of house sites to the beneficiaries and also for future requirements, is too vague and that therefore the impugned notification is liable to be declared as invalid. This court in Gajjela Narasimha Reddy and others Vs. Collector, Ranga Reddy District and another[2] and D.Rama Devi and others Vs. District Collector, East Godavari District, Eluru and others[3] examined in detail similar pleas and held that the land acquisition proceedings being expropriatory in nature, which forcibly take away the lands of the private owners, the notification issued therefor shall not suffer from any ambiguity and deprive the objectors of their valuable right to raise meaningful objections. In Gajjela Narasimha Reddy (2-supra), this court, after a detailed consideration of the case law, observed at para-20, as follows : “On a careful analysis of the ratio contained in the case law discussed above, in order to decide whether the notification issued under Section 4(1) of the Act is in conformity with the provisions of the Act, as interpreted by the plethora of judgments of the Apex Court, two aspects are required to be examined, viz., whether the purpose mentioned in the notification is specific and not vague; and such purpose is a “public purpose”. In Aflatoon and others Vs. Lt. Governor of Delhi and others (1975) 4 SCC 285), the Supreme Court held that whether the purpose specified in the notification is sufficient to enable an objection to be filed under Section 5-A would depend upon the facts and circumstances of each case.” In a very recent Judgment, in Radhe Shyam Vs. State of U.P.[4] the Apex Court in its pain-staking Judgement while exploring the relevant facets of the provisions of the Act and the nature and the powers inhered in the State for acquiring the lands of private persons and the valuable rights of the land owners who oppose the acquisitions, laid down comprehensive principles, some of which, relevant for the present purpose, are as under : (i) Eminent domain is a right inherent in every sovereign to take and appropriate property belonging to citizens for public use. To put it differently, the sovereign is entitled to reassert its dominion over any portion of the soil of the State including private property without the owner’s consent provided that such assertion is on account of public exigency and for public good – Dwarakadas Shrinivas v. Sholapur Spg. & Wvg. Co.Ltd. (AIR 1954 S.C. 119) and Jilubhai Nanbhai Khachar v. State of Gujarat (1995(Supp).(1) SCC 596). (ii) The legislations which provide for compulsory acquisition of private property by the State fall in the category of expropriatory legislation and such legislation must be construed strictly – DLF Qutab Enclave Complex Educational Charitable Trust v. State of Haryana (2003(5) SCC 622), State of Maharashtra v. B.E.Billimoria (2003(7) SCC 336) and Dev Sharan v. State of U.P. (2011(4) SCC 769). (iii) Though, in exercise of the power of eminent domain, the Government can acquire the private property for public purpose, it must be remembered that compulsory taking of one’s property is a serious matter. If the property belongs to economically disadvantaged segment of the society or people suffering from other handicaps, then the court is not only entitled but is duty-bound to scrutinize the action/decision of the State with greater vigilance, care and circumspection keeping in view the fact that the landowner is likely to become landless and deprived of the only source of his livelihood and/or shelter. (iv) 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. A public purpose, however, laudable it may be does not entitle the State to invoke the urgency provisions because the same have the effect of depriving the owner of his right to property without being heard. Only in a case of real urgency, the State can invoke the urgency provisions and dispense with the requirement of hearing the landowner or other interested persons. In my considered opinion, the valuable right of a citizen over the property cannot be taken away by acquiring the lands for unspecified purposes. The expression “and also for future requirements” is too vague and ambiguous, it is not possible for the petitioner to file effective and meaningful objections. Unless specific purpose is notified in the notification, the land owner who objects to the proposed acquisition will be seriously disabled from filing his objections to such an acquisition rendering the very purpose of giving an opportunity of filing objections in the enquiry under Section 5-A of the Act, wholly nugatory. Having regard to the ratio contained in the above noted Judgements, the impugned notification cannot be sustained and the same is accordingly quashed. The subsequent steps, if any taken in pursuance of the impugned notification, are also declared as invalid. The Writ Petition is accordingly allowed, however, with liberty to the respondents to initiate fresh proceedings in the event they still feel that acquisition of this land is necessary for a specific public purpose. ________________________ Justice C.V. Nagarjuna Reddy Date : 27-6-2011 AM [1] 2008(2) ALT 136 [2] 2008(5) ALT 233 [3] AIR 2009 A.P. 15 [4] 2011(5) SCC 553