IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE, ANDHRA PRADESH AT HYDERABAD (Special Original Jurisdiction) TUESDAY, THE FOURTEENTH DAY OF OCTOBER TWO THOUSAND AND EIGHT PRESENT THE HON'BLE MR JUSTICE C.V.NAGARJUNA REDDY WRIT PETITION NO : 14895 of 2008 Between: Vegesna Suryanarayana Raju, S/o.Krishna Raju, Vempadu(V) Kalla(M) W.G District ..... PETITIONER AND The District Collector Eluru,West Godavari District .....RESPONDENT Counsel for the Petitioner:MR.C.RAMACHANDRA RAJU Counsel for the Respondent: AGP FOR LAND ACQUISITION The Court made the following : ORDER: With the consent of the learned counsel for the parties, this writ petition is taken up for hearing and disposal at the interlocutory stage. 2. This writ petition is ﬁled for a writ of Mandamus to set aside notiﬁcation, dated 19.05.2008, issued by the respondent whereby the land to an extent of Ac.1.00 in Sy.No.11/2F and 12/7B of Vempadu Village, Kalla Mandal, West Godavari District, was notiﬁed for acquisition for providing house sites to the poor. 3. At the hearing, Sri C.Ramachandra Raju, learned counsel for the petitioner, raised three grounds in order to assail the validity of the Land Acquisition proceedings impugned in this writ petition. They are:- (1) the respondent issued impugned notiﬁcation without proper application of mind, as the same was issued in the name of the Government instead of issuing in her own name, (2) the land is shown as the land belonging to the Government in column No.2, though the name of the mother of the petitioner is shown in column No.3 and that hence the notiﬁcation is vitiated by total non-application of mind and (3) that the petitioner is a small farmer. 4. Learned Assistant Government Pleader for Land Acquisition opposed the contentions of the learned counsel for the petitioner and submitted that the Collector exercised the powers delegated to her in issuing notiﬁcation under Section 4(1) of the Land Acquisition Act, 1894 (for short ‘the Act’) and as she is acting on behalf of the Government, the notiﬁcation was issued in the name of the Government. She further stated that all the lands are shown as Government lands and the names of pattadars of all zeroyathi lands are identiﬁed as against their names and that, therefore, it is not correct to contend that the notiﬁcation was issued without application of mind. She further stated that the petitioner’s claim of being landless poor could be agitated before the Land Acquisition Officer in the enquiry pending under Section 5-A of the Act. 5. As regards the ﬁrst contention of the learned counsel for the petitioner, it is not in dispute that under the provisions of Section 4(1) of the Act, which was amended under A.P.State Amendment Act 23 of 1976, the District Collector has got power to issue notiﬁcation under Section 4(1) of the Act in the same way as the State Government is empowered. A perusal of the impugned notiﬁcation shows that it contains the following heading:- “Government of Andhra Pradesh Orders of the District Collector, West Godavari District.” It is, thus, evident that when the District Collector got the notiﬁcation published, the notiﬁcation is shown to have been issued on behalf of the Government. Every District Collector acts on behalf of the State Government and though statutory power is conferred on the District Collector to get the notiﬁcation published, he discharges this function on behalf of the Government. Therefore, I am of the opinion that there is nothing wrong in the notiﬁcation mentioning the name of the Government and mere mention of the name of the Government does not in any manner aﬀect the delegated power of the Collector in getting the notiﬁcation published. Therefore, this contention of the learned counsel for the petitioner has no merit. 6. With regard to the second contention, namely, that the land is shown as a Government land, the respondent explained the same in her counter aﬃdavit. In paragraph 4 of the counter aﬃdavit, it is stated that as per the Revenue Records, Smt.V.Anasuyamma, w/o Krishnam Raju, is the owner of the land and that her name was accordingly notiﬁed in the notiﬁcation issued under Section 4(1) of the Act. It is further explained that as per the Re-Settlement Register, all the lands are classiﬁed as Government Wet or Government Dry or Government Poramboke under the control of the Governnment, and that in respect of Zeroyathi lands, the rightful occupier is the Registered holder of the land and that, therefore, as the property is held by Smt.V.Anasuyamma, her name is rightly notiﬁed as the reputed owner of the land. The petitioner has not ﬁled any reply aﬃdavit contradicting the correctness of the statement made by the District Collector in this regard. Though in column 2, which pertains to the nature of the land, it is shown as “Government, and dry”, in column 3, which pertains to the name of the owner, the name of the mother of the petitioner is shown. As the explanation oﬀered by the Collector, in the absence of any denial by the petitioner for showing the land as Government in column 2, appears rational, I do not ﬁnd any justiﬁcation to set aside the notiﬁcation on this ground. As noted in column 3, the name of the mother of the petitioner is shown as the owner. Therefore, no prejudice whatsoever is caused to the landowner to oppose the proposed acquisition in accordance with law. I am, therefore, not inclined to accept this contention of the learned counsel for the petitioner. 7. With regard to the third contention, a perusal of the impugned notiﬁcation shows that enquiry under Section 5-A of the Act is envisaged. The petitioner is, therefore, entitled to raise all legally permissible objections, including the objection that his family is landless poor, before the Land Acquisition Oﬃcer. Therefore, it is too premature for the petitioner to raise this contention at this stage. 8. For the aforementioned reasons, the writ petition is dismissed. Liberty is given to the petitioner/land owner to ﬁle necessary objections in response to the notice to be issued for under Section 5-A of the Act. The Land Acquisition Oﬃcer shall consider the objections if any ﬁled by the petitioner/land owner and decide the same and aﬀord an opportunity of personal hearing before sending a report to the District Collector. As a sequel to dismissal of the writ petition, WPMP.No.19255 of 2008 and WVMP.No.3080 of 2008 are dismissed as infructuous. _______________________ C.V.NAGARJUNA REDDY,J 14.10.2008 v v