SC gives farmers compensation after 39 year litigation

The Supreme Court awarded a compensation of Rs 10 per square metre to those farmers whose land was acquired for construction of twin city near Mumbai about four decades ago. After tiring and expensive litigation of about 39 years, a bench comprising Justices S B Sinha and Cyriac Joseph awarded the compensation to farmers of 96 villages whose land was acquired vide notification dated May 21, 1971 issued under section 6 of the Land Acquisition Act by the Maharashtra government. It was for the construction of the twin city near Mumbai called New Bombay Project. The bench while partly allowing the appeal of the farmers of village Wahal in district Raigarh, Maharashtra enhanced the compensation from Rs 5 per sq m, that was fixed by the Bombay High Court, to Rs 10 per sq m. This judgment of the apex court is in sharp contrast with the one recently delivered by another bench of the same court headed by Justice R V Raveendran that had slammed the state machinery for invariably trying to delay the payment of compensation to the land owners. It had dragged them to court without any justification and forced the poor farmers, whose land was the only means of survival for them, to spend more than what they have been awarded as the compensation in litigation. Justice Sinha, who wrote the 14-page-judgment for the bench, noted that, ‘although the lands in question were agricultural in nature, they were being used for making a town like Mumbai. A new port known as Nhava Sheva port had come into being which is a few km away from the village. The roads were being constructed. We are also not unmindful of the fact that the price of the land may skyrocket depending upon the development as also future potentiality,’ he noted. The apex court has not issued any specific direction regarding the payment of interest for the amount for last 40 years and also regarding payment of solatium.

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