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Delhi Development Authority v. Suresh Kr. Goel & Anr.

Civil Appeal · Neutral citation not assigned (Civil Appeal No. 10946 of 2016)Decided 18 Nov 2016
Civil Appeal No. 10946 of 2016
Justice Kurian Joseph · Justice Rohinton Fali Nariman

Background

The Delhi Development Authority appealed against findings relating to the lapse of land acquisition proceedings for land involving respondents Suresh Kr. Goel and, in a connected appeal, a charitable trust. The DDA sought to retain the ability to pursue fresh acquisition of the same land despite the lapse.

Decision Breakdown

The Court held that the issue was already settled against the appellant (DDA) by its own earlier decisions in Civil Appeal No. 8477 of 2016 and Civil Appeal No. 5811 of 2015, which had already dismissed the requisitioning authority's identical arguments. Following that precedent, both connected appeals were dismissed. As with related cases decided the same month, the Court gave the DDA a one-year window from the date of the order to initiate fresh acquisition proceedings under Section 24(2) of the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013, failing which it must return physical possession of the land (if held) to the original landowners.

Lesson Learnt

A government authority whose land acquisition has lapsed is not left with an acquisition that revives automatically: it gets a defined, time-bound opportunity (here, one year) to start over, and losing that window means the land reverts to its original owner.

Official source (sci.gov.in)View Judgment (PDF)

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