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Land and Building Department, Government of NCT of Delhi & Anr. v. M/S Mass Estate (P) Ltd. & Anr.

Civil Appeal · Neutral citation not assigned (Civil Appeal No. 5423 of 2017)Decided 18 Apr 2017
Civil Appeal No. 5423 of 2017
Justice Kurian Joseph · Justice R. Banumathi

Background

The Delhi government's Land and Building Department had acquired land but neither taken physical possession of it nor paid compensation to the landowner (Mass Estate) within five years, as required to keep an acquisition alive under Section 24(2) of the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013. The Department argued that it had been prevented from acting because of an interim court order affecting adjacent land acquisitions in the area.

Decision Breakdown

The Supreme Court noted that it was undisputed that no stay order was actually operating in respect of the respondent's own land: the interim order the Department relied on applied only to adjacent acquisitions. Since nothing legally prevented the Department from either taking possession or paying compensation to this particular landowner within the five-year window, and neither step was taken, the Court held there was no merit in the Department's appeal and dismissed it, with no order as to costs.

Lesson Learnt

A government acquiring authority cannot excuse its own inaction on a specific plot by pointing to a court order that restrained action only on a different, adjacent plot: if there was no actual legal bar on taking possession or paying compensation for the land in question, the statutory five-year deadline still applies and a lapse of acquisition will follow.

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

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