A division bench of the High Court of Jammu & Kashmir and Ladakh recently upheld a decision made by the Writ Court whereby the Ld. Single Bench had refused to interfere with the award passed under the J&K Land Acquisition Act of 1990, even though it had found that the notification issued under Section 4(1) of the Act was issued when the Act was not applicable at the time of its issuance. The Writ Court had enhanced the compensation by 20% of the awarded amount without interfering with the award itself.
On March 28, 2019, a notification was issued under section 4(1) of the J&K Land Acquisition Act for acquiring land for the construction of the Semi Ring Road. However, on March 17, 2022, a corrigendum was issued to the previous notification under Section 4(1) which included the land of the petitioners. Subsequently, the petitioners challenged this decision by filing a writ petition claiming that the acquisition proceedings were not carried out in accordance with the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation & Resettlement Act (RFCTLARR), 2013.
The learned Single Judge, however, held that since the land acquisition proceedings had already been completed and the final award had been passed under the Act of 1990, it would be difficult and inadvisable at this stage to set aside the entire acquisition process. Moreover, most of the villagers whose land had been acquired had already received their compensation and the construction of the Ring Road was already in progress. Therefore, the relief claimed in the writ petition was modified, and the respondents were directed to enhance the compensation payable to the petitioners under the award by 20%. This, according to the learned Single Judge, would meet the ends of justice and serve as a penalty to the respondents for not following the correct provisions of the law.
The petitioners were dissatisfied with this judgment and filed an appeal against it. The Appellate Court had to consider whether the new notification issued on 17.03.2022 under Section 4(1) of the J&K Land Acquisition Act, Svt. 1990, would amount to the initiation of fresh acquisition proceeding. The court held that the new notification was a corrigendum that corrected the earlier notification dated 28.03.2019 by adding more lands, as stated in the notification dated 17.03.2022. Additionally, the new notification did not exclusively mention the land of the appellants only and it included the land of other owners that were already mentioned in the earlier notification. The Court held that even if the land of the appellants was included for the first time, it was grouped together with the land of others that were already part of the earlier notification. Therefore, the new notification cannot be considered a standalone notification exclusively for the land of the appellants. Consequently, the impugned Notification dated 17.03.2022 cannot be said to initiate a fresh land acquisition proceeding.
The next issue that the court examined was the legal consequences of a notification issued on March 17th, 2022 under the Jammu and Kashmir Land Acquisition Act of 1990. This notification was issued after the RFCTLARR Act had been made applicable to UT of J&K. The Court held that even if the Jammu and Kashmir Land Acquisition Act, 1990, stood repealed by virtue of the Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Act, 2019, in view of Section 6 of the General Clauses Act, 1897, any investigation or legal proceeding may be continued and enforced as if the repealing Act had not been passed. The court held that even if the RFCTLARR Act came into operation repealing the Jammu & Kashmir Land Acquisition Act, by virtue of Section 6 of the General Clauses Act, 1897, the proceedings already initiated under the Jammu and Kashmir Land Acquisition Act, 1990 would continue.
