HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE C.V.NAGARJUNA REDDY WRIT PETITION No.4561 of 2007 04.02.2008 Between: Arepalli Venkateswara Rao and another … Petitioners AND The District Collector, West Godavari and others … Respondents HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE C.V.NAGARJUNA REDDY WRIT PETITION No.4561 of 2007 ORDER: This writ petition is filed for a writ of mandamus to invalidate notification, dated 11.02.2007 issued under Section 4(1) of the Land Acquisition Act, 1894 (for short ‘the Act’). Heard Sri K.Chidambaram, learned counsel for the petitioners and the learned Assistant Government Pleader for Land Acquisition. At the hearing, it is conceded by the learned counsel for the petitioners that the main contention raised in this writ petition, namely, validity of proposal to acquire agricultural land without its conversion for non-agricultural use is no longer res integra in view of judgment, dated 28.12.2007, passed by this Court in Writ Petition Nos.18881 of 2006 and batch, wherein a similar contention has been rejected. The learned counsel for the petitioners raised certain ancillary contentions, namely, the names of the petitioners were not shown in the notification issued under Section 4(1) of the Act and that newspaper ‘leader’, in which, the impugned notification was published has no circulation in the locality. He also submitted that though notification issued under Section 4(1) of the Act did not dispense with the enquiry under Section 5A of the Act, the Land Acquisition Officer, who filed counter affidavit, stated that enquiry under Section 5A of the Act was dispensed with and in view of the interim order passed by this Court, declaration under Section 6 of the Act has not been published. I have perused the impugned notification and the averments mentioned in the counter affidavit. In the notification issued under Section 4(1) of the Act, it is specifically mentioned that respondent No.2 is entrusted with the function of holding enquiry under Section 5A of the Act, which necessarily means that it has not dispensed with the enquiry. However, respondent No.2 without any application of mind, whatsoever, filed the counter affidavit, in which, he erroneously pleaded that enquiry under Section 5A of the Act is dispensed with. This conduct of respondent No.2 deserves strong deprecation. He is cautioned not to display such conduct in future. Since enquiry is contemplated by the notification issued under Section 4(1) of the Act, the writ petition is disposed of with the direction to respondent No.2 to hold enquiry under Section 5A of the Act by giving an opportunity of personal hearing to the petitioners before seeking to proceed further with the proposed acquisition. The petitioners are left free to raise the above mentioned contention, namely, newspaper ‘leader’ in which notification under Section 4(1) of the Act is published has no circulation in the locality and, therefore, notification under Section 4(1) of the Act itself is rendered invalid. As a sequel to disposal of main petition, interim order, dated 06.03.2007 is vacated, WPMP.No.5804 of 2007 is dismissed and WVMP.No.1497 of 2007 is disposed of as infructuous. C.V.NAGARJUNA REDDY, J 4th FEBRUARY, 2008. kvni