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Dhiraj Singh (Dead) Through Legal Representatives And Others v. State Of Haryana And Others
Factual and Procedural Background
The State of Haryana issued a notification dated 22-8-1988 under Section 4 of the Land Acquisition Act, 1894 to acquire 132.06 acres of land. The Land Acquisition Collector awarded compensation at Rs 3,50,000 per acre for Chahi land and Rs 1,50,000 per acre for gair mumkin land. On applications under Section 18, the Additional District Judge enhanced compensation to Rs 101 per square yard (Award dated 14-1-1992).
Both landowners and the State filed Regular First Appeals (RFAs). A learned Single Judge of the Punjab & Haryana High Court dismissed all RFAs on 24-12-1993 (Krishan Lal v. State of Haryana). Other similarly situated landowners pursued further intra-court Letters Patent Appeals (LPAs) and, on 27-7-2005, a Division Bench in Horam v. State of Haryana fixed compensation at Rs 200 per square yard. The Supreme Court affirmed that rate in Ajay Pal v. State of Haryana.
The present appellants—also original landowners—did not file LPAs in time, citing financial constraints. When they eventually filed, the High Court refused to condone the delay and dismissed their LPAs. They have now approached the Supreme Court, which granted leave and heard the matters together.
Legal Issues Presented
- Whether the long delay in filing LPAs by the appellants should be condoned in view of their financial constraints and the liberal principles governing land-acquisition matters.
- Whether the appellants are entitled to the same enhanced compensation of Rs 200 per square yard that was awarded to other landowners affected by the identical acquisition notification.
- If compensation is enhanced, whether interest should be denied for the period of delay.
Arguments of the Parties
Appellants' Arguments
- They are agriculturists of weak financial means and could not earlier afford the cost of filing LPAs.
- Compensation disparity exists: similarly situated landowners have already received Rs 200 per square yard pursuant to Horam and subsequent Supreme Court affirmations.
- Rely on precedents where substantial delays (3240 to 4644 days) were condoned in comparable land-acquisition contexts.
Respondents' Arguments
- The State did not dispute the appellants’ financial constraints but resisted condonation of delay before the High Court (specific counter-arguments are not detailed in the opinion).
Table of Precedents Cited
| Precedent | Rule or Principle Cited For | Application by the Court |
|---|---|---|
| Horam v. State of Haryana, LPA No. 920/1994 (P&H) | Fixed compensation at Rs 200 per square yard for land under the same acquisition notification. | Treated as the benchmark rate; appellants claim parity. |
| Ajay Pal v. State of Haryana, Civil Appeal No. 610/2012 | Supreme Court affirmation of the Rs 200 per square yard rate. | Confirms validity of the benchmark compensation applied to appellants. |
| Market Committee, Hodal v. Krishan Murari (1996) 1 SCC 311 | Liberal condonation of delay (3240 days) in land-acquisition matters. | Used to justify condoning the present appellants’ delay. |
| Imrat Lal v. Collector (LA) (2014) 14 SCC 133 | Court must adopt a liberal approach toward delay where similarly situated landowners have received greater compensation. | Quoted extensively to support equitable relief for the appellants. |
| Samiyathal v. Tahsildar, Civil Appeal No. 5335/2013 | Direction under Article 142 to extend enhanced compensation to landowners who could not litigate due to poverty or ignorance. | Cited to illustrate the Court’s equitable powers and approach. |
| Collector (LA) v. Katiji (1987) 2 SCC 107 | Foundational principles for condonation of delay—substantial justice over technicalities. | Relied upon to emphasise a pragmatic, non-pedantic approach. |
| DDA v. Bhola Nath Sharma (2011) 2 SCC 54 | Applied Katiji principles in a land-acquisition setting. | Cited as reaffirmation of liberal delay-condonation doctrine. |
Court's Reasoning and Analysis
Recognising that the appellants are agriculturists whose land was compulsorily acquired, the Court held that denial of equitable compensation on purely technical grounds would be unjust. It noted:
- The undisputed parity of circumstance with landowners already awarded Rs 200 per square yard.
- The State did not challenge the appellants’ assertion of financial incapacity.
- Multiple precedents (Katiji, Market Committee, Hodal, Imrat Lal, etc.) endorse a liberal stance toward delay in land-acquisition matters.
- Inconsistent treatment had arisen: other LPAs with similar delays were condoned by the High Court, while the appellants’ were not.
- Substantial justice can be balanced with equity by denying interest only for the period of inaction, thus preventing undue enrichment while ensuring fair compensation.
Accordingly, the Court concluded that a pragmatic approach, rather than a pedantic adherence to limitation periods, was required.
Holding and Implications
Appeals ALLOWED. The Supreme Court set aside the High Court’s orders, condoned the delay in filing LPAs, and awarded the appellants compensation at Rs 200 per square yard. However, no interest is payable for the time during which the appellants remained inactive. The State must recalculate and disburse compensation within three months.
Implications: The decision ensures parity among landowners affected by the same acquisition and reinforces the Court’s liberal approach to limitation in land-acquisition cases. No new legal doctrine is created, but existing principles on delay-condonation and equitable compensation are reaffirmed.
Order
1. Permission to file the special leave petitions is granted. Delay in filing the special leave petitions and application for substitution is condoned. Application(s) for substitution are allowed and legal representatives are brought on record.
2. Leave granted. All these appeals arise out of the common and identical events whereby lands of the appellants were acquired by the Government of Haryana under the provisions of the Land Acquisition Act. The appellants are claiming enhanced compensation on the basis of the judgment LPA No. 920 of 1994 of the Division Bench of the High Court in the same fact situation. Therefore, these appeals are heard and decided by this common order for the sake of convenience. However, we shall take the facts from Civil Appeals Nos. 6599-6601 of 2014.
3. The Government of Haryana sought to acquire 132.06 acres of land vide Notification dated 22-8-1988 under Section 4 of the Land Acquisition Act, 1894 (hereinafter referred to as “the Act”). Thereafter, declaration under Section 6 of the Act was issued and award was passed on 30-3-1990. The Land Acquisition Collector assessed the compensation for the Chahi land @ Rs 3,50,000 per acre, regarding gair mumkin, etc. Compensation was assessed @ Rs 1,50,000 per acre. Applications were moved by the landowners, the appellants herein under Section 18 of the Act for enhancement of compensation. Vide Award dated 14-1-1992, the Additional District Judge awarded compensation at the rate of Rs 101 per square yard for the entire land.
4. The appellants were not satisfied and they filed regular first appeal before the High Court of Punjab and Haryana at Chandigarh. The State also filed appeals against the enhancement of compensation by the Court below. All these appeals came up for consideration before the learned Single Judge of the High Court and vide a common judgment dated 24-12-1993, passed in Krishan Lal v. State of Haryana RFA No. 1370 of 1992, the High Court dismissed all the appeals filed by the landowners and also the State of Haryana.
5. Against the abovesaid order, the similarly situated landowners went in appeal and vide judgment dated 27-7-2005 passed in Horam v. State of Haryana LPA No. 920 of 1994, a Division Bench of the High Court awarded compensation @ Rs 200 per square yard for the land under acquisition.
6. The appellants in all these appeals had preferred the regular first appeals which were heard and dismissed by the learned Single Judge along with the appeals of other persons. However, they did not challenge the order by preferring further appeal before the Division Bench, though, similarly situated landowners had preferred the appeals and in their cases, compensation was enhanced to Rs 200 per square yard. The aforesaid rate of Rs 200 per square yard has been upheld by this Court in Ajay Pal v. State of Haryana Civil Appeal No. 610 of 2012.
7. It is the case of the appellants that due to their financially weak condition, they could not file the letter patent appeals (LPAs) before the Division Bench and on coming to know of the judgment dated 27-7-2005 LPA No. 920 of 1994 rendered by the Division Bench, they also filed their appeals. However, since there was delay in preferring these appeals, the High Court has refused to condone the delay and dismissed LPA No. 1174 of 2010 the LPAs.
8. Against the orders passed by the High Court, the appellants have filed these proceedings.
9. No doubt, there is a long delay in filing the appeals. However, we find that it is a case of payment of compensation to these appellants who were the landowners and which land was taken away by compulsory acquisition. However, landowners whose lands were taken over by the same notification, have been able to get the compensation @ Rs 200 per square yard whereas the compensation given to the appellants is @ Rs 101 per square yard for their entire land.
10. It is also not in dispute that the appellants are agriculturists. Their averment that they could not prefer the LPAs because of their financially weak condition, has not been disputed by the respondents. We find that in a similar situation, this Court had condoned the delay of 3240 days in Market Committee, Hodal v. Krishan Murari (1996) 1 SCC 311. There are many other cases cited by the appellants condoning the delay in similar circumstances.
11. In the matter of land acquisition where land of peasants is acquired, a different approach has to be taken. These persons should not be deprived of the reasonable compensation for their lands. If other similarly situated landowners are given the compensation @ Rs 200 square yard, there is no reason to pay the compensation to the appellants at much lesser rate. In this context, we would like to quote the following observations from the judgment dated 29-11-2013 in Imrat Lal v. Collector (LA) (2014) 14 SCC 133:
“While we agree with Shri Narender Hooda that the averments contained in the application for condonation of delay were extremely vague and did not provide satisfactory explanation for the long delay of 1110 days, but it cannot be ignored that in identical matters another learned Single Judge had granted relief to the landowners by enhancing the compensation and this factor should not have been overlooked by the learned Single Judge while deciding the application for condonation of delay.
We can take judicial notice of the fact that villagers in our country are by and large illiterate and are not conversant with the intricacies of law. They are usually guided by their co-villagers, who are familiar with the proceedings in the courts or the advocates with whom they get in touch for redressal of their grievance. Affidavits filed in support of the applications for condonation of delay are usually drafted by the advocates on the basis of half-baked information made available by the affected persons. Therefore, in the acquisition matters involving claim for award of just compensation, the court should adopt a liberal approach and either grant time to the party to file better affidavit to explain delay or suo motu take cognizance of the fact that large number of other similarly situated persons who were affected by the determination of compensation by the Land Acquisition Officer or the Reference Court have been granted relief.
In Samiyathal v. Tahsildar Civil Appeal No. 5335 of 2013 decided on 5-7-2013, this Court took cognizance of the fact that many landowners may not have been able to seek intervention of this Court for grant of enhanced compensation due to illiteracy, poverty and ignorance and issued direction that those who have not filed special leave petition should be given enhanced compensation. The relevant portion of the judgment passed in that case is extracted below:
‘We further direct the respondents and the State of Tamil Nadu to pay the same amount of compensation to other landowners whose land was acquired by the Notification dated 22-5-1991, but who may have on account of ignorance, poverty and other similar handicaps, not been able to approach the Reference Court or may not have been able to contest the matter before the High Court and this Court. The needful be done in respect of other landowners within a period of six months. This direction has been given in exercise of the power vested in this Court under Article 142 of the Constitution.’
In view of the above discussion, the appeal is allowed, the impugned order is set aside and the delay in filing RFA No. 5477 of 2011 by the appellants is condoned.”
12. In fact, in a matter arising out of the same notification, in Civil Appeals Nos. 617-19 of 2012, this Court had rendered a judgment dated 17-1-2012 Civil Appeal No. 617 of 2012 condoning the delay of 4644 days and enhancing the compensation to Rs 200 per square yard. A perusal of the counter-affidavit filed by the respondents makes it clear that the rate of Rs 200 per square yard fixed in Horam case LPA No. 920 of 1994 (LPA No. 920 of 1994) has been upheld by this Court by dismissing SLP (C) No. … of 2006 (CC No. 3472 of 2006), (2014) 14 SCC 127 (F9) the special leave petition against the said judgment. A perusal of the said order makes it clear that it relied upon dismissal orders passed in various other special leave petitions whereby the aforesaid rate had been upheld.
13. Thus, in almost all cases, the rate of Rs 200 per square yard has been applied by the High Court and this Court.
14. The appellants are identically situated and there is no reason to meet out a different treatment to them. We also note that, while in these cases, the High Court had refused to condone the delay and dismissed the LPAs of the appellants, other LPAs were allowed by the High Court itself by condoning the delay of the same magnitude in the same circumstances.
15. Equities can be balanced by denying the appellants' interest for the period for which they did not approach the Court. The substantive rights of the appellants should not be allowed to be defeated on technical grounds by taking hypertechnical view of self-imposed limitations. In the matter of compensation for land acquisition, we are of the view that approach of the court has to be pragmatic and not pedantic.
16. The principles regarding condonation of delay particularly in land acquisition matters, have been enunciated in Collector (LA) v. Katiji (1987) 2 SCC 107, wherein it is stated in para 3 as under:
“3. The legislature has conferred the power to condone delay by enacting Section 5 of the Limitation Act of 1963 in order to enable the courts to do substantial justice to parties by disposing of matters on ‘merits’. The expression ‘sufficient cause’ employed by the legislature is adequately elastic to enable the courts to apply the law in a meaningful manner which subserves the ends of justice—that being the life-purpose for the existence of the institution of courts. It is common knowledge that this Court has been making a justifiably liberal approach in matters instituted in this Court. But the message does not appear to have percolated down to all the other courts in the hierarchy. And such a liberal approach is adopted on principle as it is realised that:
(1) Ordinarily a litigant does not stand to benefit by lodging an appeal late.
(2) Refusing to condone delay can result in a meritorious matter being thrown out at the very threshold and cause of justice being defeated. As against this when delay is condoned the highest that can happen is that a cause would be decided on merits after hearing the parties.
(3) ‘Every day's delay must be explained’ does not mean that a pedantic approach should be made. Why not every hour's delay, every second's delay? The doctrine must be applied in a rational common sense pragmatic manner.
(4) When substantial justice and technical considerations are pitted against each other, cause of substantial justice deserves to be preferred for the other side cannot claim to have vested right in injustice being done because of a non-deliberate delay.
(5) There is no presumption that delay is occasioned deliberately, or on account of culpable negligence, or on account of mala fides. A litigant does not stand to benefit by resorting to delay. In fact he runs a serious risk.
(6) It must be grasped that judiciary is respected not on account of its power to legalise injustice on technical grounds but because it is capable of removing injustice and is expected to do so.”
(emphasis in original)
17. The aforesaid judgment was followed by this Court in DDA v. Bhola Nath Sharma (2011) 2 SCC 54, which was also a matter concerning land acquisition.
18. We, accordingly, allow these appeals. Impugned orders of the High Court are set aside. Delay in filing the LPAs is condoned. It is held that the appellants shall be entitled to enhanced compensation @ Rs 200 per square yard. However, for the period of delay in approaching the High Court by way of LPAs, in all these cases, no interest should be paid to them. Compensation shall be worked out accordingly and paid to the appellants within a period of three months from today.
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