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Union of India & Anr. v. Tarsem Singh & Ors.

Civil Appeal · 2019 INSC 1061Decided 19 Sept 2019
Civil Appeal No. 7064 of 2019
Justice Rohinton Fali Nariman · Justice Surya Kant

Background

This was a lead/illustrative judgment deciding a large batch of appeals by the Union of India and the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) against a Punjab and Haryana High Court ruling. Land belonging to Tarsem Singh and others had been acquired in 2004-05 for widening National Highway No.1-A in Punjab; an arbitrator fixed enhanced compensation but, because the National Highways Act (unlike the Land Acquisition Act) does not provide for solatium or additional interest, none was awarded. The High Court had held that denying solatium and interest to NH Act land-owners, while such benefits are available under the Land Acquisition Act, was discriminatory, and struck down Section 3J of the NH Act to that extent, prompting the Union's appeal.

Decision Breakdown

The Supreme Court agreed with the High Court's conclusion, holding that there was no rational basis to deny owners whose land is acquired under the National Highways Act the same solatium (under Section 23(1A) and (2)) and interest (under the proviso to Section 28) that owners get under the Land Acquisition Act, since both statutes serve the same purpose of compulsorily acquiring private land for public use. It declared that these Land Acquisition Act provisions on solatium and interest would now apply to acquisitions under the National Highways Act as well, and held Section 3J unconstitutional and violative of Article 14 to that extent. Applying this ruling to the facts of the lead case itself, the Union of India's specific appeal (arising from SLP(C) No. 9599/2019, concerning Tarsem Singh's land) was dismissed; the judgment then went on to individually dispose of each of the many connected appeals in the batch based on which of eleven specific grounds had or had not actually been raised and argued below.

Lesson Learnt

Landowners whose property is acquired for national highways are constitutionally entitled to the same solatium and interest benefits available to landowners under the general Land Acquisition Act: the government cannot pay less to one group of displaced owners than another for materially similar compulsory acquisitions.

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

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