Relief for owners in land acquisitions

Relief for owners in land acquisitions

The SC has held if land is taken over from the owner even before issuing notification under the Land Acquisition Act, the owner is entitled to rent, compensation for wrongful use and occupation from the date of actual dispossession till the date of notification. In this case, Revenue Division Officer vs M Ramakrishna, the Andhra Pradesh government took over a large sweet lime orchard in 1988 without notification. The owner moved the high court complaining that he had not only lost the orchard but the earth has been so damaged by building a percolation tank that no trees would thereafter grow. The high court asked the government to pay compensation to the owner. Following this, the government issued the notification under the Land Acquisition Act in 1993. The government then argued that the damages and interest upon it would be only from the date of the notification. The high court did not agree. 

‘Secrecy in award of contracts leads to abuses’

“Secrecy in the award of Government contracts is liable to result in the worst possible abuses by excluding a large segment of the community who may have no knowledge of the fact that government is likely to disburse benefits in the form of a particular public contract. Consequently, while courts have recognized that the award of public contracts by inviting tenders is the norm, exceptions have been noted in compelling situations. The exception, however, cannot be allowed to become the rule,” a division bench of the Bombay high court has stated in its judgment in the case, MIAECT (P) Ltd vs Hindustan Computers.