Gujarat High Court dismisses 120 Farmers' plea against land acquisition speeding up bullet train project
In a major boost to ambitious 1.08-trillion-rupees bullet train project, Gujarat High Court on Thursday dismissed the petition filed by farmers objecting to land acquisition process.
The Court has also upheld the move of Gujarat government to put an end to the consent clause in Centre's 2013 Land acquisition law, and striking down a provision of carrying out a social impact assessment and offering relief and rehabilitation package on this basis.
A division bench headed by Justice Anant Dave had completed the hearing in January and reserved its order. It also held that the compensation offered to the farmers in fair.
Interestingly, the Supreme Court had also directed Gujarat High Court on Aug 10 to expedite the hearing of farmers affected by land acquisition process for the bullet train.
As many as 59 different petitions were filed by landowners in South Gujarat districts. Earlier, nearly 1000 farmers had filed a one-page affidavit in the Gujarat High Court stating they had not given any consent to the land acquisition process.
The farmers and state government had submitted the charts showing rates fixed to acquire land parcels in villages where the acquisition was to take place for the bullet train project and the express highway to the court.
Meanwhile, the farmers had been seeking higher compensation as compared to the one offered by the state government. They had claimed that compensation ought to be fixed on the basis of the current market value of land and not on the 'jantri' rate fixed in 2011.
They want compensation to be in accordance with provisions of the Central government's land acquisition law and not as per provisions in Gujarat's amended law for land acquisition.
The nodal agency for the 508-17-km Ahmedabad-Mumbai bullet train, National High-Speed Rail Corp has, so far, acquired 622 hectares of the total 1380 hectares required for the project.
The Corp requires about 5400-5500 plots from private owners in about 198 villages of Gujarat. Of this, they have received consent and paid compensation to acquire 2600 plots. "It is in only 15 villages we are facing some issues, primarily over the value of the land to be paid.
By end of this year, we hope to crack the issue and acquire at least 75%-80% of the plots," Achal Khare, managing director, National High-Speed Rail Corp, had said early this month. The project is expected to be completed by December 2023 and the Corp is expected to award all the tenders for the project by June next.
The bench upheld the validity of the Land Acquisition Act, amended by the Gujarat government in 2016 and subsequently approved by the President.
