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Land Acquisition Off... v. Mohd. Amri Khan And ...
Factual and Procedural Background
The State of Andhra Pradesh issued a notification on 4 August 1977 under Section 4(1) of the Land Acquisition Act, 1894 declaring that 35 acres 35 gunthas of land were likely to be needed for the Hyderabad Urban Development Authority (HUDA). Public notice of the substance of this notification was disseminated in the locality on 3 October 1977, nearly two months later. After a Section 5-A inquiry, the State excluded 6 acres 6 gunthas belonging to Gayatri Devi Cooperative Housing Society and, on 10 January 1979, issued a Section 6 declaration covering the remaining 29 acres 29 gunthas.
Notices under Section 9 were served, an award was passed on 27 July 1981, and possession was sought. Landowners (the respondents) filed writ petitions in the High Court of Andhra Pradesh challenging the Section 4(1) and Section 6 notifications. The High Court quashed both notifications, accepting the contention that publication in the Gazette and local notice must occur on the same day. The Land Acquisition Officer appealed to the Supreme Court by special leave.
Legal Issues Presented
- Whether, on a true interpretation of Section 4(1) of the Land Acquisition Act as amended for Andhra Pradesh, public notice in the locality must be given within forty days of Gazette publication and, if not, whether the Section 4(1) notification is invalid.
- Whether the retrospective operation of the Land Acquisition (Andhra Pradesh Amendment and Validation) Act, 1983, which introduced the forty-day limit with effect from 12 September 1975, invalidates the impugned notifications issued in 1977.
- Whether the amendment should be construed prospectively to preserve acquisitions made before its enactment.
Arguments of the Parties
Appellant's Arguments (State/Land Acquisition Officer)
- The 1983 Amending Act should be treated as prospective; otherwise, acquisitions valid when made would be retrospectively invalidated—an intention the Legislature could not have had.
- The Legislature enacted the amendment only to validate acquisitions affected by an Andhra Pradesh High Court Full Bench judgment; after that judgment was overruled in Deepak Pahwa, the amendment had become superfluous and should not disturb earlier acquisitions.
Respondents' Arguments (Landowners)
- Local publication occurred more than forty days after Gazette publication, violating the amended Section 4(1); consequently, both the Section 4(1) and Section 6 notifications are void.
- The retrospective clause in the Amending Act unequivocally applies from 12 September 1975, rendering the impugned notifications invalid.
Table of Precedents Cited
| Precedent | Rule or Principle Cited For | Application by the Court |
|---|---|---|
| Deepak Pahwa v. Lt. Governor of Delhi, (1984) 4 SCC 308 | Publication in Gazette and local notice must be contemporaneous, but need not be simultaneous; a substantial time-gap may indicate bad faith. | Explained that, but for the 1983 Amending Act, the ratio in Deepak Pahwa would have governed the validity of the notifications; nevertheless, the retrospective amendment made that inquiry unnecessary. |
| Full Bench judgment of Andhra Pradesh High Court in WP 5722 of 1981 (3 December 1982) | Held that Gazette publication and local notice must occur on the same day, invalidating any deviation. | Identified as the decision the Legislature intended to neutralise through the Amending Act; its view was subsequently overruled by the Supreme Court in Deepak Pahwa. |
Court's Reasoning and Analysis
The Supreme Court noted that the dispositive issue was the impact of the Land Acquisition (Andhra Pradesh Amendment and Validation) Act, 1983. Section 2 of that Act amended Section 4(1) to mandate that the Collector give public notice “within forty days” of Gazette publication. Section 1(3) expressly gave the amendment retrospective effect from 12 September 1975. Consequently:
- The impugned Section 4(1) notification, published on 4 August 1977, was followed by local notice only on 3 October 1977—outside the statutory forty-day limit.
- Violation of the amended Section 4(1) rendered the notification void, which in turn invalidated the subsequent Section 6 declaration.
- The appellant’s plea to construe the amendment prospectively was rejected. The Court emphasised that the Legislature’s clear language (“shall be deemed to have come into force on 12-9-1975”) could not be overridden by conjecture about legislative intent.
- The Court found no inconsistency between the amended forty-day requirement and the principle in Deepak Pahwa; rather, the amendment fixed a concrete temporal limit that would otherwise have required factual scrutiny under Deepak Pahwa.
Holding and Implications
Appeals DISMISSED. The judgments of the Andhra Pradesh High Court quashing the Section 4(1) and Section 6 notifications are affirmed, though on different grounds.
Implications: The decision confirms that, in Andhra Pradesh, failure to give local notice within forty days of Gazette publication (for notifications issued on or after 12 September 1975) fatally vitiates the acquisition process. The ruling applies the 1983 Amending Act as written and does not set a new nationwide precedent but underscores the binding nature of state-specific amendments with retrospective effect. Each party was ordered to bear its own costs.
P.N Bhagwati, C.J— These appeals by special leave would have perhaps met with a different fate if the Land Acquisition Act, 1894 in its application in the State of Andhra Pradesh had not been amended by the Land Acquisition (Andhra Pradesh Amendment and Validation) Act, 1983 (hereinafter referred to as the Amending Act) with retrospective effect from 12-9-1975. The retrospective amendment made by the Amending Act in Section 4 sub-section (1) of the Act completely invalidates the notifications under Section 4 sub-section (1) and Section 6 issued by the Andhra Pradesh Government and the Judgment of the High Court quashing these notifications has therefore to be sustained. The facts giving rise to these appeals are few and may be briefly stated as follows:
2. The Government of Andhra Pradesh issued a notification under Section 4 sub-section (1) stating that a total area of 35 acres and 35 gunthas was likely to be needed for the purpose of the Hyderabad Urban Development Authority (hereinafter referred to as HUDA). The notification was published in the Andhra Pradesh Gazette on 4-8-1977 and public notice of the substance of the notification was given at convenient places in the locality, after a period of about 2 months, on 3-10-1977. Thereafter an inquiry under Section 5-A of the Act was held by the Special Land Acquisition Officer and as a result of the inquiry, the Andhra Pradesh Government decided to exclude an area of 6 acres 6 gunthas belonging to one Gayatri Devi Cooperative Housing Society and issued a notification under Section 6 of the Act on 10-1-1979 declaring that the remaining area of land admeasuring 29 acres 29 gunthas was needed for the purpose of HUDA. Notices under Section 9 were then issued to the respondents in these appeals who are the owners of different parcels of land comprised in the area notified under Section 6 and after holding an inquiry, the Special Land Acquisition Officer made an Award on 27-7-1981 and issued notices to the respondents calling upon them to deliver possession of the land acquired. The respondents thereupon filed writ petition in the High Court of Andhra Pradesh challenging the validity of the notifications under Section 4 sub-section (1) and Section 6 issued by the Andhra Pradesh Government.
3. There were several contentions raised on behalf of the respondents against the validity of the impugned notifications but, barring one, all were rejected by the High Court. The one contention which found favour with the High Court was that local publication of the substance of the notification under Section 4 sub-section (1) was not made on the same day on which the notification was published in the Official Gazette, but it was made almost 2 months later and the notification under Section 4 sub-section (1) was therefore invalid and the notification under Section 4 sub-section (1) being the foundation of the jurisdiction to proceed further with the acquisition, the notification under Section 6 must also fall. The High Court, following an earlier Full Bench decision rendered by it on 3-12-1982 in Writ Petition 5722 of 1981 and other allied writ petitions, accepted this contention and quashed the notifications under Section 4 sub-section (1) and Section 6. The Land Acquisition Officer representing the State thereupon preferred the present appeals with special leave obtained from this Court.
4. The principal question which would seem to arise in these appeals is as to whether the High Court was right in taking the view that on a true interpretation of Section 4 sub-section (1) public notice of the substance of the notification under that section must be given in the locality on the same day on which the notification is published in the Official Gazette and if it is not whether that would have an invalidating consequence. There was no decision of the Supreme Court on this question at the time when the High Court gave its Judgment in the present case, but subsequent to the delivery of the Judgment by the High Court, this question came up for consideration before a Bench of this Court in special leave petitions directed against a judgment of the Delhi High Court which had taken a view different from that taken in the present case by the Andhra Pradesh High Court. This Court held in Deepak Pahwa v. Lt. Governor of Delhi (1984) 4 SCC 308 that though publication in the Official Gazette and public notice in the locality are two vital steps required to be taken under sub-section (1) of Section 4 without which the steps contemplated under Section 4 sub-section (2) cannot be undertaken, there is nothing in sub-section (1) of Section 4 which requires that the publication in the Official Gazette and public notice in the locality must be simultaneous or immediately after one another. This Court pointed out that what sub-section (1) of Section 4 requires is that publication in the Official Gazette and public notice in the locality must be contemporaneous but contemporaneity does not involve simultaneity or immediacy. There is bound to be a gap of time between publication of the Official Gazette and public notice in the locality but what is necessary is that they should not be separated by such a long interval of time that the continuity of action may appear to be broken by a deep gap. The Court observed:
“If there is publication in the Gazette and if there is public notice in the locality, the requirements of Section 4(1) must be held to be satisfied unless the two are unlinked from each other by a gap of time so large as may lead one to the prima facie conclusion of lack of bona fides in the proceedings for acquisition. If the notification and the public notice are separated by such a large gap of time, it may become necessary to probe further to discover if there is any cause for the delay and if the delay has caused prejudice to anyone”.
The judgment impugned in the present appeals was clearly overruled by this decision in Deepak Pahwa case (1984) 4 SCC 308 and it was held that notifications under Section 4 sub-section (1) and Section 6 could not be struck down as invalid merely on the ground that public notice of the substance of the notification under Section 4 sub-section (1) was not given on the same day as the publication in the Official Gazette. We would have had to consider, in the light of the observations contained in the decision in Deepak Pahwa case (1984) 4 SCC 308 as to whether there was such a large gap between the publication in the Official Gazette and the public notice in the locality that the continuity of action would appear to be broken and that would have necessitated examination of the question whether there was any justifiable cause for the delay and if the delay had caused prejudice to the respondents. But before the decision in Deepak Pahwa case (1984) 4 SCC 308 came to be given by this Court, the Andhra Pradesh Legislature enacted the Amending Act which came into force with effect from 23-6-1983 and it is this Amending Act which renders it unnecessary for us to consider whether on the application of the ratio of the decision in Deepak Pahwa case (1984) 4 SCC 308 the impugned notification under Section 4 sub-section (1) can be sustained or it is liable to be struck down as invalid.
5. We may now proceed to refer to the relevant provisions of the Amending Act. The Amending Act was passed by the Andhra Pradesh Legislature in order to counteract the effect of the Full Bench decision of the Andhra Pradesh High Court in WP 5722 of 1981 and other allied writ petitions where inter alia it was held that publication in the Official Gazette and public notice in the locality must be on the same day or else the notification under Section 4 sub-section (1) would be invalid. The Amending Act was therefore given retrospective effect and sub-section (3) of Section 1 expressly enacted that the Amending Act shall be deemed to have come into force on 12-9-1975. Every provision in the Amending Act must therefore a fortiori be deemed to have come into effect from the date namely, 12-9-1975. Section 2 of the Amending Act provided that in the Land Acquisition Act, 1894 in its application to the State of Andhra Pradesh for the words “the Collector shall cause”, the words “the Collector shall, within forty days from the date of publication of such notification, cause”, shall be substituted. Sub-section (1) of Section 4 in its application to the State of Andhra Pradesh therefore read as follows with effect from 12-9-1975:
“Whenever it appears to the appropriate Government that land in any locality is needed or is likely to be needed for any public purpose, a notification to that effect shall be published in the Official Gazette and the Collector shall, within forty days from the date of publication of such notification, cause public notice of the substance of such notification to be given at convenient places in the said locality”.
What therefore sub-section (1) of Section 4 as it stood from and after 12-9-1975 provided was that the notification under that section shall be published in the Official Gazette and public notice of the substance of such notification shall be given in the locality “within forty days from the date of publication of such notification”. This requirement would obviously apply to every notification under sub-section (1) of Section 4 issued by the appropriate Government on or after 12-9-1975. If in case of a notification issued under Section 4 sub-section (1) on or after 12-9-1975, public notice of the substance of such notification is not given in the locality within forty days from the date of publication of such notification in the Official Gazette, it would introduce a fatal infirmity invalidating such notification. Here in the present case, the notification under Section 4 sub-section (1) was published in the Official Gazette on 4-8-1977 but public notice of the substance of such notification was given in the locality as late as 3-10-1977 i.e more than forty days after the date of publication of such notification in the Official Gazette. There was therefore clearly a violation of the mandate enacted in sub-section (1) of Section 4 as it stood from and after 12-9-1975 and the notification under Section 4 sub-section (1) was liable to be struck down as invalid, though on a ground different from that which found favour with the High Court.
6. The learned counsel appearing on behalf of the appellant however made a valiant but futile attempt to escape from the consequence of retrospective amendment of sub-section (1) of Section 4 by contending that Section 2 of the Amending Act which introduced the amendment in sub-section (1) of Section 4 should not be read as having retrospective effect, but should be construed as prospective in operation. The argument urged on behalf of the appellant was that the Legislature enacted the Amending Act for the purpose of validating acquisitions made after 12-9-1975 which were liable to be declared invalid on account of the Full Bench judgment of the Andhra Pradesh High Court in WP 5722 of 1981 and other allied writ petitions and it could never have been the intention of the Legislature to invalidate acquisitions which were valid when made. The Legislature, contended the learned counsel, proceeded on the assumption that the Full Bench judgment of the Andhra Pradesh High Court represented the correct law on the subject and it was on that assumption that the Amending Act was enacted by the Legislature. If, on the Full Bench judgment of the Andhra Pradesh High Court being reversed by this Court in Deepak Pahwa case (1984) 4 SCC 308 the assumption made by the Legislature turned out to be incorrect it was found that the Legislature proceeded on an erroneous view of the law in enacting the Amending Act, the Amending Act, argued the learned counsel, must be considered superfluous; and not the Amending Act, but the correct law as it prevailed prior to the Amending Act must be applied. This argument urged on behalf of the appellant is wholly specious and must be rejected. It is an argument of despair and it has only to be stated in order to be rejected. It is impossible to accept the proposition that because the Amending Act proceeded on an erroneous view of the law, it must be considered superfluous and must be deprived of all effect. Whatever be the reason for which the Legislature enacted the Amending Act and here the reason no doubt was to set at naught the effect of the Full Bench judgment of the Andhra Pradesh High Court — the Amending Act is on the statute book and is in force with effect from 12-9-1975 and it must be given effect according to the plain natural meaning of its words. Sub-section (3) of Section 1 of the Amending Act provides in the clearest terms, not susceptible of any ambiguity or doubt that it shall be deemed to have come into force with effect from 12-9-1975. It does not carve out any exception in relation to Section 2 of the Amending Act and that section must also therefore, according to the clear and express mandate contained in sub-section (3) of Section 1, be deemed to have come into effect on 12-9-1975. It is true that if, in case of a notification under Section 4 sub-section (1) issued after 12-9-1975, there is a gap of more than forty days between the date of its publication in the Official Gazette and the date when public notice of its substance was given in the locality. Sub-section (1) of Section 4 as amended with retrospective effect from 12-9-1975 would render such notification invalid. But that can be no ground for denying to the amendment in sub-section (1) of Section 4 retrospective effect, which sub-section (3) of Section 1 of the Amending Act expressly directs that it shall have. There is in fact to our mind no inconsistency between the mandate of sub-section (1) of Section 4 and the law as declared by this Court in Deepak Pahwa case (1984) 4 SCC 308. This Court said in Deepak Pahwa case (1984) 4 SCC 308 that there should not be such a large gap between publication in the Gazette and public notice in the locality as would be indicative of break in the continuity of action. What the amended sub-section (1) of Section 4 does is to legislatively lay down the limit of the time gap beyond which it must be presumed that there is a break in the continuity of action. We must therefore reject the argument of the learned counsel appearing on behalf of the appellant that sub-section (3) of Section 1 of the Amending Act must be read down so as to exclude from its operation Section 2 of that Act.
7. We accordingly dismiss the appeals though on a ground different from that which appealed to the High Court. Each party will bear and pay its own costs throughout.
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