The Allahabad High Court has slapped a cost of Rs 1 crore on the Uttar Pradesh government for acting "in gross violation" of an order regarding a piece of land in Ghaziabad district, physical possession of which was not taken even four decades after it was acquired.
A division bench of justices Tarun Agarwala and Vipin Sinha passed the order yesterday with the direction that the state shall deposit the money before the RegistrarGeneral of the court by the next date of hearing on September 15.
The order came on a petition filed by Surendra and others who had sought to draw the court's attention towards the fact that the piece of land in Loni in Ghaziabad was acquired way back in 1973 but till date neither its physical possession was taken nor any compensation paid to those who were affected by the exercise.
The petitioners had also challenged an order passed by the Secretary of the department concerned whereby he had directed the competent authority to "take recourse to the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013 for acquisition and payment of compensation".
The court grimly observed that while deciding another petition in 2014, it had held that the UP State Industrial Development Corporation - which is named as the owner of the land in the revenue records - "does not require the land" and "consequently, the state should have acted upon and exempted the land from acquisition".
"When the land is not required by the acquiring body, the question of proceeding any further under the Act of 2013 does not arise. Prima facie, the impugned order is in gross violation of the direction of this court. Prima facie, a heavy cost is required to be imposed upon the state," the court ordered.
It also directed the Secretary, who had passed the impugned order, to file a counter affidavit within two weeks.
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