IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Civil Writ Petition No.8462 of 2010 Date of decision: 29.6.2010 Ram Chander and others …..Petitioners versus State of Haryana and others ……Respondents CORAM: Hon’ble Mr.Justice Jasbir Singh Hon’ble Mr.Justice Augustine George Masih Present: Mr.Sudhir Aggarwal, Advocate for the petitioners Ms.Palika Monga, DAG Haryana Jasbir Singh, J. (Oral) This writ petition has been filed with a prayer to quash notification dated 20.11.2009 (P3) issued under Section 4 of the Land Acquisition Act, 1894 (in short, the Act). Further challenge is to the notification dated 2.2.2010 (P6) issued under Section 6 of the Act. It is apparent from the records that vide notification Annexure P3, land subject matter of this writ petition, which is ownership of the petitioners, was acquired for public purposes i.e. for construction of 400/220 KV Power Sub-station in village Gwalior Tehsil Manesar, district Gurgaon. It is necessary to mention here that when above said notification was issued, provisions of Section 17(2) (c) of the Act were also invoked. Declaration under Section 6 of the Act was issued on 2.2.2010. Notices under Section 9 of the Act were issued to the petitioners on 23.4.2010. Civil Writ Petition No.8462 of 2010 In this writ petition, the petitioners have laid challenge to the above said notifications on the ground that opportunity to file objections under Section 5-A of the Act, was not given to them and the very fact that notification under Section 6 of the Act was issued after about two months of the issuance of notification under Section 4 of the Act, demonstrates that such an opportunity could have been given. Be that as it may, delay in issuance of subsequent declaration under Section 6 of the Act is not very long, on the basis of which, any relief can be granted to the petitioners. The land was acquired for construction of an electricity sub-station and as per information supplied, laying of the lines is under process. At the time of hearing of this writ petition, we asked the counsel as to what objection the petitioners could have raised if opportunity was given to them, then he by making reference to the site plan Annexure P8 suggested that alternative land, which is under ownership of the Gram Panchayat could have been used for the purpose for which land of the petitioners was acquired. To the said averment, reply has been filed and specific reference has been made to a letter dated 17.6.2010 written to Land Acquisition Collector by the office of the Power Grid Corporation of India Limited. Relevant portion of the letter reads thus:- “1) It is to be mentioned that the proposed land at village Gwalior, tehsil Manesar for construction of sub-station was selected as per the technical requirements viz. availability of incoming and outgoing line corridors, the approach, connectivity, natural drainage etc. Before freezing the particular land, POWERGRID examined five alternative sites and found the said piece of land technically most suitable for construction of the sub-station. 2 Civil Writ Petition No.8462 of 2010 1A) So far as the proposal of the petitioner in para no.12 of the writ petition is concerned, the Panchayat Land has not been found technically suitable for construction of 400 KV GIS Sub-station POWERGRID. As mentioned in para 1 above, the HVAC sub-station can be constructed in a land where incoming and outgoing line corridors, approach, connectivity, natural drainage etc. are available. The Panchayat land does not meet the above technical parameters required for construction of the HVAC sub-station. It is further to be noted that in the Panchayat land, no corridors are available for incoming and outgoing transmission lines in all 4 directions. In the north of the proposed Panchayat land, there is forest and hills, in the south, there is existing residential area, in the east direction, there is an army training institute and Amity University and in the west direction, NH-8 is located. Thus the Transmission line corridor is blocked in all the four directions. (emphasis supplied) 2. POWERGRID has following explanation regarding, invoking of the urgency provisions (Section 17 of the Land Acquisition Act). The investment Approval for the subject project was accorded on dated 21.1.2009 and as per this approval, the project is to be commissioned within a period of 33 months i.e. by 20.10.2011. Since the land is the basic requirement for commencement of the construction activities, it is to be handed over to the various construction agencies immediately. In view of this POWERGRID requested for invoking urgency clause vide their letter no.NI/GIS/MANES/ 3 Civil Writ Petition No.8462 of 2010 LAN/LAO/09 dated 27.01.09 as the contract for the construction of the proposed sub-station was expected to be awarded by the end of March 2009. The agency was later awarded the contract in July 2009 and was ready to mobilize with men and materials to start the work. Hence we requested for invoking the urgency clause i.e. Section 17 of the Land Acquisition Act.” In the written statement, it has specifically been mentioned that the alternative land suggested by the petitioners was not suitable for the purpose for which land of the petitioners was acquired. We are satisfied with the reply filed. It is apparent from the records that before selecting the site in dispute, five different sites were examined and land of the petitioners was found most suitable as per technical requirement for setting up of a sub- station. No case is made out for interference. Dismissed. (Jasbir Singh) Judge 29.06.2010 (Augustine George Masih) gk Judge 4