9911796707
TMI Blog1968 (12) TMI 113X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... wever, turns upon the array of the respondents. 3 . In Mysore there are two Acts bearing on acquisition of private land for public purposes. The first is the Mysore Land Acquisition Act which follows the same scheme as the Land Acquisition act in force in India. The other is the City of Bangalore Improvement Act, 1945. The latter Act constitutes a Board of Trustees charged with the execution of the Act and in its third Chapter lays down the duties and powers of the Board and the manner in which improvement schemes are to be effectuated. Sections 14 to 18 and Section 27 outline the procedure by which acquisition of land is to be made. Section 52 of the Act lays down that any provision of law contained in any other enactment in force in Mysore repugnant to any provision contained in the Improvement Act is to stand down to the extent of the repugnancy. The Mysore Land Acquisition Act has also Sections 4, 5-A and 6 analogous to the corresponding sections in the Central Land Acquisition Act in force in the whole of India. 4. The land in respect of which the present dispute has arisen is Survey No. 2 of Raja Mahal Village, Kasha Hobli, Bangalore North Taluk. This land belonged original ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... with Articles 213(1) and 254(1) of the Constitution. The State of Mysore relied upon the Mysore Land Acquisition Act for the validity of the proceedings. The petitioners submitted that the public purpose was linked up with the improvement of the city of Bangalore and thus fell to be governed by the Improvement Act. They contended that the discrimination still continued if the attempted inclusion of Section 27-A in the City Improvement Act was held to be unconstitutional. It may be mentioned that in one petition a ground of estoppel had been raised, as expenditure had been incurred in laying out the plots and the Board had received payment for its sanction. 6. The petitions in the High Court, therefore, proceeded on the following three broad points - (1) validity of Ordinance I of 1960 and the Mysore Act XIII of 1960; (2) noncompliance with the City of Bangalore Improvement Act, 1945; and (3) discrimination between two classes of cases, i.e. those in which the provisions of Chapter III of the Improvement Act were followed and those like the case of the petitioners in which they were not followed. An additional point of estoppel was special to one petition only. 7 . The High Court ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... nsists of only two sections. The first section gives the short title and the second section deals with validation of certain acquisition of lands and proceedings and orders connected therewith. The second section reads as follows : "2. Validation of certain acquisition of lands and proceedings and orders connected therewith : (1) Notwithstanding anything contained in the City of Bangalore Improvement Act, 1945 (Mysore Act V of 1945), or in any other law, or in any judgment, decree or order of any court : (a) every acquisition of land for the purpose of improvement, expansion or development of the City of Bangalore or any area to which the City of Bangalore Improvement Act, 1945, extends, made by the State Government acting or purporting to act under the Mysore Land Acquisition Act, 1894 (Mysore Act VII of 1894), at any time before the commencement of this Act, and every proceeding held, notification issued and order made in connection with the acquisition of land for the said purpose shall be deemed for all purposes to have been validly made, held to issue, as the case may be, and any acquisition proceeding commenced under the Mysore Land Acquisition Act, 1894, for the ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... en transferred or stand transferred to the Board of Trustees for the improvement of the City of Bangalore. The only room left for questioning any order or notification is in accordance with the provisions of the Mysore Land Acquisition Act, 1894, the Land Acquisition Act, 1894, and the rules made under those Acts. 11. The State Government claims that this Validating Act cuts short all controversy. It has validated all past actions notwithstanding any breach of the Improvement Act or any other law or the decree and order of the High Court. It further submits that the action cannot be called in question on the ground that State Government was not competent to make the acquisition of land or on any other ground whatsoever. It further submits that proceedings already afoot can continue. 12. This contention is met by the respondents on three main grounds : The first is that there are still two Acts which cover the same field but prescribe two different procedures. In one procedure there is an inquiry, assessment of the public purpose, preparation of scheme, and in the other, there is none. The more prejudicial procedure which is that of the Acquisition Act must be disallowed as it is ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... he Improvement Act must fail. 1 5 . Mr. S. T. Desai, however, contends that an acquisition hit by Article 14 or anything done previously cannot ever be validated, unless the vice of unreasonable classification is removed and the Validating Act is ineffective for that reason. This argument leads to the logical conclusion that a discrimination arising from selection of one law for action rather than the other, when two procedures are available, can never be righted by removing retrospectively one of the competing laws from the field. This is a wrong assumption. In Piara Dusadh and Others v. K. E. (1944) FCR 61 trials before special Judges (not Sessions Judges under the Code of Criminal Procedure) were deemed to be trials before Sessions Judges in accordance with the code and the Federal Court upheld the constitutionality of the ordinance by which this fiction was created. The supremacy of the Legislatures in India, within the constitutional limits of their jurisdiction is as complete as that of the British Parliament. If two procedures exist and one is followed and the other discarded, there may in a given case be found discrimination. But the Legislature has still the competence to ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
|
