NEPC INDIA LTD Vs. STATE OF TAMIL NADU

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE petitioner is NEPC India Limited represented by its Director. THEy filed a Special Revision Petition being S.R.P.No.4/2002 before the Tamil Nadu Land Reforms Special Appellate Tribunal, Chennai under Section 83 of the Tamil Nadu Land Reforms (Fixation of Ceiling on Land) Act, 1961 (for short Land Reforms Act), challenging an order dated 12.11.2001 passed by the first respondent State.

(2.) IN view of the abolition of the Tribunal, the matter stood transferred to this Court and was renumbered as CRP No.1971 of 2003. However, a learned Judge of this court opined that no Civil Revision Petition will lie as the officers whose orders under challenge were not a Court but only statutory authorities. Therefore, the CRP was converted into writ petition and notice was ordered.

(3.) THE grounds raised by the petitioner Company was that the refusal to grant exemption was against the spirit of Section 37A of the Act and the provisions of Sections 7 and 20 cannot be invoked when their exemption application is pending. THE Government ought to have exempted the land by virtue of Sections 3(22) and 3(19) of the Land Reforms Act as the lands were not used for agricultural purposes. Keeping an application for grant of permission for four years and later refusing the same was erroneous. THE sale of excess land took by the petitioner without the permission of the first respondent was not against the provisions of the Act. THEre is no provision which prohibits the land owner to sell the excess land.