NISHAKAR KHATUA & FIVE ORS. Vs. STATE OF ORISSA & FOUR ORS.

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE petitioner nos. 1 to 6 are the owners of the lands located at villages Dhinkia, Govindpur, Bhuyanpal, Polanga, Bayanala Kandha, Nolia Sahi and Nuagaon covered under the impugned notifications Annexure -2 series issued under Sections 4 and 6 of the Land Acquisition Act. They have filed the present writ petition on their behalf and on behalf of the other land owners whose lands are covered under the said notifications and who have no access to justice seeking the following reliefs urging various facts and legal contentions.

(2.) IN the said writ petition, Misc. Case No. 8071 of 2011 has also been filed praying for the following interim reliefs urging various facts and placing reliance upon the documents produced in support of the writ petition.

(3.) THE State Government has issued the impugned notifications under Sections 4 and 6 of the Land Acquisition Act (hereinafter called the L.A. Act') to acquire the lands in favour of the proposed Steel Plant of M/s. POSCO India Pvt. Ltd. (hereinafter called in short 'POSCO'). The acquisition proceedings have been started at the instance of the Orissa Industrial Infrastructure Development Corporation (hereinafter called in short 'the Corporation'), a statutory Corporation having its registered office at IDCO Towers, Janpath, Bhubaneswar to acquire lands in favour of POSCO, a Company registered under the Companies Act, 1956 having its registered office at Fortune Towers, Chandrasekharpur, Bhubaneswar represented by its Managing Director who is opposite party no.4 in the writ petition. The Corporation made requisition to the District Collector of Jagatsinghpur to acquire the land for the purpose of establishing the proposed Steel Plant by POSCO. Accordingly, Section 4 notifications were issued to acquire the land of the villages covered in the impugned notifications for the public purpose in favour of the POSCO Company to establish its Steel Plant in the acquired land. The case of the petitioners is that the acquisition of land in the name of POSCO through the Corporation is not permissible in law as the acquisition of land is in favour of a Private Company. Therefore, the acquisition of land must be made by the State Government by following the procedure contemplated in Part VII of the L.A. Act. It is further stated that the waiver of statutory right of the land owners under Section 5(A) of the L.A. Act by the State Government by resorting to emergency provision of Section 17(4) of the L.A. Act is a colourable and mala fide exercise of power by the State Government there being no emergency as provided in Section 17(2) in respect of the acquisition of land in favour of POSCO Company for the establishment of proposed Steel Plant. Therefore, it is stated that exercising the power by the State Government waiving the statutory right under Section 5A of the Act is bad in law and publishing section 4(1) read with Section 17(4) notifications without there being an order of the State Government to invoke emergency clause is a gross and patent violation of the fundamental and statutory rights guaranteed to the petitioners and other land owners under Articles 14, 19 and 21 and Constitutional right guaranteed under Article 300A of the Constitution of India. It is further stated that there has been no emergency of the nature mentioned in Section 17(2) which is evident from the latest status report posted in the official website of District Jagatsinghpur which indicates that notwithstanding the issue of impugned notice under Section 4(1) of the Act, subsequent progress of the acquisition work has been held up as agitations are not allowing entry of any revenue personnel into the concerned area in connection with land acquisition work.