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Land Acquisition Bill
The Supreme Court on Wednesday said the compensation for land acquisition cannot be assessed in a mechanical manner but must be guided by considerations of equality, equity and justice. A bench of Justices Surya Kant and Ujjal Bhuyan said a fundamental principle in land acquisition jurisprudence was that lands with similar locational and developmental potential must be compensated equitably unless clear, objective distinctions justify otherwise. The bench said it must caution against an "excessively positivist" approach in matters of land acquisition. "It is well understood that the very exercise of assessing compensation is antithetical to rigid formalism. Compensation cannot be assessed in a mechanical or formulaic manner but must be guided by considerations of equality, equity, and justice," it said. The apex court's verdict came on a batch of cross-appeals filed by the Haryana State Industrial and Infrastructure Development Corporation and several landowners challenging the ...