Himachal Pradesh High Court
Ntpc Ltd.(Kol Dam) vs Baboo Ram And Others ....Cross ... on 12 June, 2017
Author: Ajay Mohan Goel
Bench: Ajay Mohan Goel
IN THE HIGH COURT OF HIMACHAL PRADESH, SHIMLA
Cross Objection No. 27 of 2017
IN
.
RFA No. 97 of 2013
Decided on: 12.6.2017.
NTPC Ltd.(Kol Dam), Barmana ....Non Objectioner/Appellant.
Versus
Baboo Ram and others ....Cross Objectioners/Respondents.
______________________________________________________
Coram
The Hon'ble Mr. Justice Ajay Mohan Goel, Judge
Whether approved for reporting?1 No.
For Non Objectioner : Mr. Pushpender Verma, Advocate vice
Mr. Kul Bhushan Khajuria, Advocate.
For Cross Objectioners : Ms. Veena Sharma, Advocate for
respondents No. 1 to 5,8,10 to 12,
22, 27, 29 to 31, 45 to 50, 51,54
to 56, 58, 59, 61 and 62.
: Mr. Vikram Thakur, Dy. Advocate
General for respondent-State.
Ajay Mohan Goel, J. (Oral).
By way of these cross objections, objectioners/claimants have challenged the award passed by learned District Judge in Land Reference Petition No. 62 of 2007 dated 22.9.2012 on the ground that the market value of the land as determined by learned District Judge is 1 Whether reporters of the local papers may be allowed to see the judgment?
::: Downloaded on - 19/06/2017 23:58:55 :::HCHP 2meagre, inadequate and not in accordance with the actual market value. As per the objectioners, learned District Judge has not .
correctly appreciated the statements of the relevant witnesses which has resulted in miscarriage of justice. On these bases it has been pleaded by objectioners that the award of compensation at the rate of Rs. 4,25,266/- per bigha is highly inadequate and in fact the market rate of the land at the time of notification is more than 01 lac per biswa.
2. I have heard learned counsel for the parties and have also gone through the award passed by learned court below.
3. A perusal of the award passed by learned District Judge demonstrates that while calculating the market value of the land so acquired, learned court below has relied upon the parameters laid down by Hon'ble Supreme Court in Chiman Lal Hargovinddas Vs. Special Land Acquisition Collector, AIR 1988 Supreme Court 1652 and Ravinder Narain and another Vs. Union of India, 2003(4) Supreme Court Cases 481. Besides this, there is a definite finding returned by learned court below as to why sale deeds Ext. PA to Ext.
PE were not taken into consideration by it for the purposes of determining the market value. It has been held by learned court below that said sale deeds did not reflect the true market value of the land as ::: Downloaded on - 19/06/2017 23:58:55 :::HCHP 3 in all these sale deeds sale consideration was not either paid or received before Sub Registrar and it was mentioned in the same that .
sale consideration had already been received by the vendee at home which raised suspicion in the mind of the Court about the genuineness of said sale deeds. Learned court below also held that there was no material placed on record by the claimants to demonstrates that the subject matter of the sale deeds was either of the same kind or of the same potential as the land acquired. Learned court below also held that the said sale deeds could not be taken into consideration for determining the compensation as evidence led established that villagers had gained knowledge about the likelihood of their land being brought under acquisition.
4. In my considered view, the reasoning so returned by leaned court below while disbelieving sale deeds Ext. PA to Ext. PE suffer from no infirmity. During the course of arguments learned counsel for the cross objectioners could not satisfy or convince this Court as to how the findings so returned by learned court below were perverse. After relying upon the judgment passed by Hon'ble Supreme Court in P. Venkataraju Vs. Special Tehsildar (Land Acquisition), 1996 (8) Supreme Court Cases 614, State of U.P. and others Vs. Kumari Devi (Smt.) and others 1996 (8) Supreme Court ::: Downloaded on - 19/06/2017 23:58:55 :::HCHP 4 Cases 577, it was held by learned court below that sale deeds Ext. PA to Ext. PE which relate to small parcels of land appear to have been .
manipulated to inflate the market value. It is a matter of record that a large chunk of land proposed to be acquired for setting up the Kol Dam Project and therefore no prudent man would purchase small pieces of land especially when it was in the knowledge of the locality that the land in the area in issue was proposed to be acquired. Besides thi,s during the course of arguments learned counsel for the cross-
objectioners also could not point out any material on record from which it could be inferred that the market value of the land acquired was much more than the value of the assessed by learned court below.
In fact the uniform grant of compensation for all categories of land by learned court below has been accepted by the cross-objectioners.
Therefore, in this background in the absence of there being any cogent material on record from which it can be inferred that the market value assessed by learned court below of the land acquired is less than the value which the acquired land so commanded, in my considered view there is no merit in these cross-objections and the same are accordingly dismissed. No order as to costs.
(Ajay Mohan Goel) Judge 12th June, 2017.
(Guleria) ::: Downloaded on - 19/06/2017 23:58:55 :::HCHP 5 .
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