SAIL to pay for Bokaro Steel land: HC

Jharkhand High Court has ruled that land measuring 44,000 acres acquired by undivided Bihar state during 1959-1962 for setting up the Bokaro Steel Plant(BSL) belongs to the Steel Authority of India Limited (SAIL) and that it was liable for paying compensation and other liabilities if required.

The court held that for the acquired land execution of deed of conveyance by the state in favour of SAIL was not required.

A division bench comprising Justice MY Eqbal and Justice DGR Patnaik in arecent judgment ordered that the enhanced compensation awarded by the land acquisition judge (LAJ), should be paid to the claimants (land losers) with interest and other benefits.

The bench further directed the land acquisition officer (LAO) to dispose all 10,312pending cases of the claimants (land losers) preferably through Lok Adalat and make payment of the compensation out of Rs 70 crore deposited by SAIL. The bench held that if any further amount were to be required for making payments, SAIL should pay the same.

The high court also held, "The lands in occupation of the state of Jharkhand for the offices of the state government, shall continue to be occupied by it and shall not be asked to be handed over to the BSL, SAIL".

The court further ruled that SAIL would provide land free of cost to the state government, if the latter would require the same for expansion of its offices.

It may be mentioned that the litigation over the rate of compensation of the acquired land for the BSL for setting up its plants were pending for the last several years. The LAG and the LAO had determined the compensations and prepared several awards.

But the claimants (land losers) could not get compensation till date. Aggrieved by the compensation awarded by the LAO, the land losers moved applications for reference and the LAJ sometime in 1990 awarded enhanced compensation amount to the claimants (land losers).

The state government had challenged the judgments of the LAG by filling several appeals to the high court over the awards of enhanced compensation amount.

The high court while delivering the judgment in the case referred to the state government and said, "It is crystal clear that the conduct of the authorities of the state, the revenue minister and the revenue secretary is wholly malafide, in as much as, the SAIL for whose purpose the land was acquired, is ready to pay the entire compensation. But the government is adamant on dragging the poor land losers into litigation and thereby deprive the land losers of their due compensation".