HC stays notification to acquire land for Omaxe in Mohali

The Punjab and Haryana High Court has stayed the operation of a Punjab Government notification dated July 9 under which 23.2939 acre area in Mohali villages was sought to be acquired “for and on behalf of M/s Omaxe New Chandigarh Developers Private Limited”.

Passing the interim order, the Division Bench of Justice Deepak Sibal and Justice Lapita Banerji directed that “operation of the impugned notification dated July 9 shall remain stayed”. The Bench also fixed September 18 as the next date of hearing and ordered the matter to be put on the urgent list.

The direction came on a petition filed by Satnam Singh and others. Appearing before the Bench on their behalf, senior counsel Ashwani Kumar Chopra and advocate Akshit Chaudhary said “through the impugned notification, the Government of Punjab intends to acquire 23.2939 acres in different villages of SAS Nagar (Mohali) district, which includes the petitioners’ land”.

The senior counsel further contended that the notification itself recorded that the acquisition was being undertaken “for and on behalf of M/s Omaxe New Chandigarh Developers Private Limited”. He said the notification declared that the land was being acquired for “a project for planned development”, as such, prior consent of the gram sabha/landowners was not required.

The counsel added the “omission on the government’s part” clearly violated the provisions of the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013. The counsel contended it “mandatorily provides that when the government intends to acquire land for and on behalf of private companies, even for a public purpose, such acquisition can take place only with the prior consent of at least 80 per cent of the families to be affected by such acquisition”.

He drew attention to another provision that stipulated that the process of obtaining prior consent of the affected families and the social impact assessment study in terms of Act was to be carried out simultaneously.

After hearing preliminary submissions, the Bench issued notice of motion, which was accepted by Additional Advocate-General Maninder Singh and another advocate Tejeshwar Singh before praying for time to file written statements. Before parting with the order, the Bench asserted: “As an interim measure, operation of the impugned notification dated July 9 shall remain stayed.”