1 IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY APPELLATE SIDE, BENCH AT AURANGABAD WRIT PETITION NO. 7732 OF 2010 Ganpat s/o. Shridhar Joshi, (Died through Legal Representatives) 1. Prabhakar s/o. Ganpatrao (Joshi) Kate, Age 76 yrs., Occu. Agriculture, R/o. Waghebabulgaon, Tq. Kaij, Dist. Beed. 2. Sakharam s/o. Sundarrao Joshi, Age 76 yrs., Occu. Agriculture, R/o. As above. ....Petitioners. Versus 1. The State of Maharashtra, Through Secretary, Revenue and Forest Department, Mantralaya, Fort, Bombay-32. 2. The Special Land Acquisition Officer No. 1, Beed, H.Q. Ambajogai, Dist. Beed. 3. The Collector, Beed. Tq. & Dist. Beed. ....Respondents. Mr. A.A. Nimbalkar h/f. Mr. V.D. Salunke, Advocate for petitioner. Mr. K.G. Patil, A.G.P. for respondent Nos. 1 to 3. CORAM : B.R. GAVAI AND A.A.SAYED, JJ. DATED : 27th September, 2010. ORAL JUDGMENT : [ Per B.R. GAVAI, J.] 1. Rule. Rule made returnable forthwith. Heard by consent. 2 2. By way of present petition, the petitioners challenge the order dated 7th of May 2010, vide which the application filed by the present petitioners for giving them benefit of orders passed in Reference Nos. 560/1987 and 566/1987 came to be rejected. 3. The land of the petitioners was acquired in the year 1986 for the purpose of construction of Waghebabulgaon Medium Project. After the acquisition of land, an award came to be passed by the Special Land Acquisition Officer on 23rd of September 1986. In accordance with the provisions of Section 12 (2) of the Land Acquisition Act notice was served upon the predecessor in title of the petitioners and he was directed to receive the compensation. Accordingly, the petitioners' predecessor in title had received the compensation. 4. It appears that in the meantime, the owners of the similarly circumstanced lands had filed references under section 18 of the said Act being References Nos. 560/1987 and 566/1987. In the said references, the learned Reference Court enhanced the amount of compensation. In this background, the petitioners made an application for granting benefit of awards passed in the references in view of Section 28-A of the Land Acquisition Act. The same was rejected, on the ground that the earlier award was accepted by the petitioners without any protest. Being aggrieved thereby the petitioners filed the present petition. 3 5. Shri. Nimbalkar, learned counsel appearing for petitioners submits that the respondent No. 2 has totally erred in passing the impugned award. He further submits that since the learned Reference Court had awarded enhanced compensation in the case of similarly circumstanced owners of the lands, the petitioners had made an application for getting the benefit of the said references. He, therefore, submits that the impugned award is liable to be quashed and set aside. 6. Section 28-A of the Land Acquisition Act, 1894 reads thus :- "28A. (1) Where in an award under this Part, the Court allows to the applicant any amount of compensation in excess of the amount awarded by the Collector under section 11, the persons interested in all the other land covered by the same notification under section 4, sub-section (1) and who are also aggrieved by the award of the Collector may, notwithstanding that they had not made an application to the Collector under section 18, by written application to the Collector within three months from the date of the award of the Court require that the amount of compensation payable to them may be re-determined on the basis of the amount of compensation awarded by the Court: Provided that in computing the period of three months within which an application to the Collector shall be made under this sub-section the day on which the award was pronounced and the 4 time requisite for obtaining a copy of the award shall be excluded. (2) The Collector shall, on receipt of an application under sub-section (1), conduct an inquiry after giving notice to all the persons interested and giving them a reasonable opportunity of being heard, and make an award determining the amount of compensation payable to the applicants. (3) Any person who has not accepted the award under sub-section (2) may, by written application to the Collector, require that the matter be referred by the Collector for the determination of the Court and the provisions of section 18 to 28 shall, so far as may be, apply to such reference as they apply to reference under section 18." It can, thus, be seen that the very purpose of Section 28-A is to enable the persons, who were aggrieved by the award of the Collector, who had not filed reference under section 18, to get the benefit of enhanced compensation awarded by the Court to the similarly circumstanced land owners in the references filed under section 18. The reasoning given by the respondent No. 2 is totally contrary to the provisions of Section 28-A. The very purpose of this section is to enable the persons, who had not filed the references under Section 18 and to take benefit of award passed in similarly circumstanced lands by the Reference Court under Section 18. We, therefore, find that the approach of the respondent No. 2 is totally contrary to the legal position. 5 7. In that view of the matter, the impugned order is quashed and set aside. The matter is remitted back to the respondent No. 2 to consider it afresh. The respondent No. 2 shall decide the application filed by the petitioners under section 28-A, on merits, within the period of three months from today, in the light of aforesaid observations made hereinabove, after giving an opportunity of being heard to the petitioner. Rule is, therefore, made absolute on the aforesaid terms. [ A. A. SAYED ] [ B. R. GAVAI ] Judge Judge ssc/wp7732.10