BENGALURU: Acquiring poor farmers’ land and putting it in the hands of real estate developers is a daylight dacoity by the state authorities to favour land sharks, said the High Court of Karnataka, setting aside the order passed by a single judge bench in favour of a New Delhi based private firm.
The division bench said the Karnataka Industrial Area Development Board’s (KIADB) benevolence towards the petitioner – Royal Fragrances Private Limited (RFPL) – can be measured from the fact that though the demand was for only 12 acres of land, the board allotted 29 acres and 7 and a half guntas to the company. The quickness with which the KIADB and the state machinery acted to acquire the land for the RFPL flouting the prescribed procedure would throw light on malafide and illegality in acquiring the lands and its diversion to land mafia, it said.
A division bench of Justice DK Singh and Justice Tara Vitasta Ganju made these scathing remarks in their order dated February 27, allowing the appeal filed in 2013 by legal heirs of deceased Patel Jetalal Ramaji and one another questioning the single judge’s order dated March 3, 2013, passed on the petition filed by the RFPL.
Pointing out that the application of RFPL dated August 30, 2001, had been allowed within 18 days by the High Level Committee, the division bench noted that everything appears to be stage-managed to help and create a land bank for the real estate development for private benefit at the cost of the poor farmers and public interest.
The bench said the acquisition of the land in favour of the RFPL is nothing but a colourable exercise of power and in violation of the mandatory procedure. “The speed with which the land was acquired for it is a complete mala fide exercise of power and such acquisition cannot be upheld. It was a daylight dacoity on poor farmers by the state authorities in favour of the land sharks. No person can be deprived of his property without due process of law and that too, when the property is acquired for public purpose. Therefore the impugned order passed by the single judge is liable to be set aside,” the bench noted.
In its petition before the single judge, the RFPL challenged the decision taken by the state government in 2009 and a direction issued to the KIADB to denotify the land in Survey No. 10/2 measuring 23 guntas and Survey No. 10/3 measuring 13 guntas in Devarabisanahalli in Bengaluru South Taluk, which were purchased by the appellants in 2000. The single judge bench had allowed the same.
Referring to an incomplete application filed by RFPL before the High Level Committee stating that 12 acres of land in Devarabisanahalli was identified for setting up an IT Park, the division bench stated that the manner in which the application has been filed would suggest that the land acquisition for such a company was a stage-managed and a pre-determined affair. “Such an application ought to have been thrown in the dustbin. But the said application was acted upon,” the Bench said.
Further, the division bench observed that on the said application, the entire state machinery was put on the fast lane to acquire the land for the applicant. The real purpose of the land acquisition for the said company was not for the industrial development in the state, but to put the valuable assets for a meagre amount in their hands of real estate developers for residential and commercial purposes, the bench said.
The court also referred to the report submitted by the chief executive officer of the KIADB in 2004, requesting the government to enquire into the background of the companies, including of the appellant, and assess their requirements before granting in land, saying that land mafia was involved in usurping the land of farmers.
Highlighting the farmers protest against acquisition of land, the CEO stated that the appellant and two other entities with a common director had been allotted valuable land to the extent of 100 acres, 25 acres and 29 acres 5 guntas, respectively, the bench said.