New Delhi: Last week, the Supreme Court issued a stern warning to the Maharashtra government for dragging its feet in settling a six decades-old matter with a Pune-based family, whose 24 acres of land were illegally taken over by the state government in 1961. This has given the Bahirat family hope that curtains will finally close on their long struggle against the mighty State to get compensated for their loss.
The case, at present, is being fought by the fourth generation of the family. Declared lawful owners of the land — situated in Pune’s Pashan area — by the Bombay High Court in 1985, the family, according to the HC order, was supposed to get an alternate plot from the Maharashtra government. The original land could not be returned to the family as by then, it had been handed over to the Centre that has set up a defence ministry establishment there.
However, an inadvertent oversight by state government officials led to the earmarking of notified forest land for the family, compounding the contestation that has not just delayed justice for them, but is also likely to cost the state exchequer heavily.
While hearing the family’s application for monetary compensation last week, a bench led by Justice B. R. Gavai told the Maharashtra government that its offer to pay a little over Rs 37 crore was not sufficient. The court reminded the state that the land has been in its unauthorised possession for more than six decades, and therefore, the compensation amount should be calculated in terms of the current ready reckoner (minimum rate fixed by the government for stamp duty for sale of land).
The bench also gave the state government another option, that it formally acquire the land and pay the family in terms of the current land acquisition law. In case the compensation is finalised under the Right to Fair Compensation Act 2013, the state might have to cough up more than Rs 100 crore to give to the Bahirat family.
“You increase the compensation or we shall direct all your Ladli Behna, Ladli Bahu schemes to be stopped,” Justice Gavai told Maharashtra government counsel Nishant Katneshwar. When the lawyer asked if the bench was hinting at raising the amount to Rs 50 crore, the judge responded: “It better be more than that, definitely not less.”
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‘Inam’ or not? What was the dispute
A dispute over the nature of the land’s ownership began in 1961, when the government of Bombay, through the Bombay Service Inams Abolition Act 1953, abolished its character as a ‘watan land’, following which its ownership was vested with the state.
‘Watan’ means ‘Inam’ or a gift given by a ruler to their subject in lieu of services. During British rule, certain lands were given to particular persons for services rendered by them for the government, or for the community or to both. In Maharashtra, many ‘watans’ were abolished in 1950-60.
Abolition of ‘watan’, however, did not divest the original landowner of the title, but required them to pay revenue to the government to get the land re-granted.
The Maharashtra government’s contention is that the original landlord from the family failed to pay the requisite ‘nazrana’ (an amount paid for measuring of the land), and therefore, it remained with the state. In 1961, it was handed over to the Armament Research Institute, officially transferred in July of that year.
When the landlord failed to convince the state about his land not being an ‘inam’ since his ancestors had purchased it, he moved the trial court where he succeeded in proving his ownership. The state’s appeal against the trial court in the Bombay High Court and, thereafter in the Supreme Court, were rejected in 1985.
The findings of all the courts affirmed that the land’s character as an ‘inam’ land was lost when it was sold in an auction and purchased by the landlord’s ancestors. Hence, the state’s takeover of the land was declared illegal by the courts, and it was directed to allot an alternate plot of land to the family.
From then began the saga of multiple court rounds for the family. Despite the HC and top court orders, the state kept dilly-dallying over the allotment, for which it went back to the Bombay High Court in 1989. This round of court battle ended in 2004 when the state and the family settled for a parcel of land at Mouje Kondhwa Khurd in Pune.
The family was forced to move court again when the state suspended clearances given earlier for the land’s development by putting a condition that it was an ‘inam’ land and until the requisite payment is not made, it would remain with the government. This condition was annulled by the Bombay HC that gave a declaration in favour of the family.
Alternate land granted a protected forest area
Four years later, the family was in for shock again. A government notice to recall the order of grant of the alternate land in Mouje Kondhwa Khurd was served to them. It was issued under the directions of the Supreme Court-appointed Centrally Empowered Committee (CEC) that assists the top court in forest-related matters.
This notice informed the family that the alternate land was a protected forest area under an 1879 central government notification and allotting it for private use was prohibited. Also, without hearing them, the CEC, in its report accused the family of misleading the Bombay HC when grant of alternate land was finalised in 2004, the Bahirats claimed in their application before the Supreme Court.
The CEC said the family suppressed the 1879 notification to get the land allotted in its favour and asked the state to cancel it.
“The family learnt about the CEC proceedings only when the recall of land allotment notice was served to them,” one of the lawyers appearing in the matter in SC told ThePrint, adding it appeared that the government was unaware of the 1879 notification.
“Large tracts of land were notified as forest at that time. Somewhere in 1902/03 these pastures were handed back to various revenues for agricultural purposes. However, they were never denotified for agricultural purposes due to which they technically continue to be treated as notified forest areas,” the lawyer quoted above explained.
So even though the state never designated the land as a protected forest, technically it continues to be one due to the notification, a position that CEC reiterated in its report, the lawyer further said.
Stuck in this legal quagmire, the family moved the Supreme Court in 2009 with a plea to direct the state to either denotify the land or compensate them.
Denotification was ruled out by the state, which agreed to compensate the family financially.
Initially, the Maharashtra government offered to pay Rs 14 lakh to the family. Since the state officially transferred the land to the Centre in 1963, it took that year as the cut-off period to calculate the compensation amount.
Hope after years in limbo
The matter had been in cold storage in the Supreme Court since 2015. Though the application used to get listed, it was never heard conclusively. It came up for hearing last month before Justice Gavai’s bench, which decided to dispose it off. It told the state to come up with a reasonable compensation amount.
In response Maharashtra government filed an affidavit, saying it had decided to show some “sympathy” to the family by taking the land value as per the “ready reckoner” that was introduced in 1989. That is how the state calculated Rs 37 crore as monetary compensation for the family.
According to the Bahirat family’s legal team, the legal title of the land continues to be theirs and the state had dispossessed them illegally. And, since the title belongs to them, the government should either purchase it as per the current market rate or acquire it in terms of the 2013 Fair Compensation Act, the current land acquisition law. The family, as per the legal framework, is also entitled to damages for 60 years, the legal team said.
(Edited by Gitanjali Das)
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