Ananda Kumar Chakraborty And Anr. vs State Of West Bengal And Ors. on 24 November, 1976
Counsel for the petitioner drew our attention to the decision of the Supreme Court in the case of Mahant Sankarshan v. State of Orissa, ; there the Supreme Court observed that the benefit of Article 31-A of the Constitution would be available not only to those laws which by themselves provided for compulsory acquisition of property for public purpose but also to laws amending such laws, provided the assent of the President was obtained to such amending Act. It was to be presumed that the President gave his assent to the amending Act in its relation to the Act it sought to amend and this was more so when by the amending law the provisions of the earlier law relating to compulsory acquisition of property for public purpose were sought to be extended to new kinds of properties. In assenting to such law the President assented to new categories of properties being brought within the operation of the existing law and he in effect assented to law for the compulsory acquisition for public purpose of these new ategories of property. The Supreme Court observed that the assent of the President to the Orissa Estates Abolition (Amendment) Act, 1954 amending the Orissa Estates Abolition Act (Act 1 of 1952) brought the same under the protection of Article 31-A as a necessary consequence. The amending Act, according to the Supreme Court, should be considered in relation to the old law which it had sought to extend and the President assented to such an extension or in other words to a law for the compulsory acquisition of the property for public purpose.