R.F.A. No. 465 of 1997 [ 1] IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH R.F.A. No. 465 of 1997 (O&M) Date of decision: August 23,2010 Mange Ram and another .. Appellants v. The State of Haryana .. Respondent CORAM: HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE RAJESH BINDAL Present: Mr. Gorakh Nath, Advocate for the land owners. Mr. Ashish Gupta, Assistant Advocate General, Haryana. ... Rajesh Bindal J. This order will dispose of R.F.A. Nos. 465, 488 to 492, 694, 696 to 698, 863, 864, 925, 938 to to 949 and 1052 of 1997, as common questions of law and facts are involved. The land owners are in appeal seeking further enhancement of compensation for the acquired land, whereas the State has filed appeals seeking reduction thereof. The facts have been extracted from R.F.A. No. 465 of 1997. Briefly, the facts of the case are that vide notification dated 5.7.1989, issued under Section 4 of the Land Acquisition Act, 1894 (for short, `the Act'), State of Haryana acquired 15.28 acres of land, situated in the revenue estate of village Sultanpur, Hadbast No. 80, Tehsil and District Sonepat for construction of 220 KV Sub Station of HSEB at Sonepat. The Land Acquisition Collector (for short, `the Collector') awarded compensation of ` 1,00,000/- per acre for the land abutting Sonepat-Bahalgarh road and for the land located of the road @ ` 75,000/- per acre, dividing the land in Blocks `A' and `B'. Dissatisfied with the award of the Collector, the land owners filed objections. On reference under Section 18 of the Act, the learned court below assessed the compensation @ ` 1,50,000/- per acre for Block `A' and 1,25,000/- per acre for Block `B'. Learned counsel for the land owners raised a solitary argument, namely, that the land in question is located on Sonepat-Bahalgarh road quite close R.F.A. No. 465 of 1997 [ 2] to Sonepat city. The acquisition for development as Sector 12 was carried out vide notification dated 17.5.1990. For that, land pertaining to village Fazilpur was acquired and the boundary of village Fazilpur is quite close to the acquired land. For the acquisition of land for development as Sector 12, this court vide judgment dated 24.9.2007 in R.F.A. No. 1718 of 2001-Atam Parkash v. State of Haryana and others, had assessed the value of the acquired land located on Sonepat-Bahalgarh road @ ` 160/- per square yard. Considering the fact that the land in the present case is located on Sonepat-Bahalgarh road, the land owners should be awarded the same amount of compensation. On the other hand, learned counsel for the State submitted that it is a case where the State had produced evidence on record, which clearly justified the award of the Collector. For the land located on the main road, sale deed (Ex. R2) was produced, which was registered on 6.5.1987, whereby land was sold at an average price of 80,000/- per acre. Even if increase @ 12% per annum is added thereon, the same would come out to about ` 1,00,000/- per acre. The same was the award of the Collector. As far as land, which is located of the road is concerned, sale deed (Ex. R4) was produced, which was registered on 18.5.1989, just prior to the date of acquisition in the present case. The average price paid therein per acre was ` 65,306/-. The aforesaid sale deed clearly justified the award of the Collector. It was further submitted that reliance on the judgment of this court in Atam Parkash's case (supra) is totally misplaced for the reason that there is no site plan on record to show the distance of the acquired land dealt with in the aforesaid judgment. Merely because a part of the land, which was located on Sonepat-Bahalgarh road and was pertaining to village Fazilpur, which is located adjoining to village Sultanpur, the judgment cannot be relied upon as a precedent or a piece of evidence to determine the fair value of the acquired land. Even otherwise, the land acquired for development as Sector 12 was carved out vide notification dated 17.5.1990, i.e., about 10 months after the acquisition under consideration. Heard learned counsel for the parties and perused the relevant referred record. As far as claim made by the land owners seeking enhancement of compensation relying upon the judgment of this Court in Atam Parkash's case (supra) is concerned, I do not find any substance therein. The acquisition therefor was carried out vide notification dated 17.5.1990. The land therein is pertaining to village Fazilpur, which is adjoining to village Sultanpur, but unless there is a site plan on record showing the location of the land acquired in the aforesaid case and R.F.A. No. 465 of 1997 [ 3] in the present case, this court is not in a position to record a finding that both the pieces of land were comparable and determine the same amount of compensation for the land acquired in the present case, which was about ten months prior thereto. However, this court does not even find any reason to interfere with the impugned award, whereby the amount of compensation has been enhanced by the learned court below. The sale deeds produced by the State being below the award of the Collector deserve to be rejected. For the reasons mentioned above, I do not find any merit in the present appeals. Accordingly, the same are dismissed. (Rajesh Bindal) Judge August 23,2010 mk