- (1.) Challenge in the present writ petition is to the notifications dated 20.04.2010 and 12.01.2011 issued under Sections 20-A and 20-F of the Railways Act, 1989 (for short 'the Act') respectively, for acquisition of land in Tehsil Khanna, Samrala and Payal etc. for the purpose of execution, maintenance, management and operation of Eastern Dedicated Freight Corridor in District Ludhiana.
(2.) The land of the petitioner is situated in Village Jaspalon, Tehsil Khanna, almost 20 kms from the village/area of Dhandari Kalan. It is averred by the petitioner that the Ministry of Railways in order to augment the rail transport capacity to meet the growing freight traffic decided to develop freight corridors along its busy trunk routes. The western trunk route has been marked from Jawahar Lal Nehru Port in Mumbai to Tuglakabad and Dadri, near Delhi and the Eastern Dedicated Freight Corridor is planned from Dhandari Kalan, Ludhiana in Punjab to Dankuni near Kolkata.
(3.) The petitioner is stated to be a company, who has established its container freight station at Ludhiana. The petitioner company is said to have secured about 10 acres of land around the erstwhile Jaspalon Railway Station along with the Ludhiana New Delhi railway line in order to create the planned infrastructure realising the development of rail fed inland container Depot/container freight station was imperative to serve these sectors based in the Northern region. The land secured by the petitioner had rail front of about 525 meters, whereas 1000 meters of railway front is required. The petitioner persuaded the villagers of village Tamkodi to part with 83 kanals 12 marlas of their land in exchange of 132 kanals of petitioner's land located in Village Jaspalon, so as to have land to create 1000 meters of rail front. Therefore, the petitioner claims that it has sufficient land at Jaspalon and Tamkodi for its own rail terminal.;