Thread by @legaljournalist

So what exactly is the controversy surrounding the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013 (Land Acquisition Act, 2013) and the Supreme Court Bench? #thread

The genesis of the controversy lies in a judgment delivered by a Supreme Court Bench of Justices Arun Mishra, AK Goel and M Shantanagoudar on February 8, 2018 in Indore Development Authority Vs. Shailendra (Dead) Through Lrs. And Ors. barandbench.com/actus-curiae-s…

This judgment pertained to Section 24 of the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013.

By way of the above judgment, the three judge Bench answered five questions in relation to Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013 and Land Acquisition Act, 1894.

Importantly, the judgment by a 2:1 majority held that 2014 judgment passed by the Supreme Court in Pune Municipal Corporation case to be per incuriam.

The catch was that the Pune Municipal Corporation judgment was also rendered by a three-judge Bench comprising Justices RM Lodha, Madan Lokur and Kurian Joseph on it.

Indore Development holding Pune Municipal Corporation as per incuriam was rendered despite the fact that it was brought to the notice of the Bench by counsel for landowners that Pune Municipal Corporation was also by a three-judge bench. This is recorded in the judgment itself.

This was against judicial propriety and established principles on per incuriam which required that the matter be placed before a larger Bench.

While Justice Lodha who was one of the judges who had given the Pune Municipal Corporation judgment had retired by the time Indore Development judgment came out, Justice Lokur and Justice Kurian Joseph were still in Supreme Court.

As luck would have it, certain land acquisition matters came up for hearing before the Supreme court on February 21, 2018. This happened before a Bench which comprised of Justice Lokur and Justice Kurian Joseph and Justice Deepak Gupta.

It was the case of the petitioners before this Bench that the matter is covered by the verdict in the Indore Development Authority case. However, the respondents had a different view on the applicability of Indore Development Authority.

Mukul Rohatgi appearing for respondents argued that a 3-judge bench cannot hold a decision by another 3-judge bench per-incuriam. He said that once a 3-judge bench decides not to agree with a judgment by another 3-judge bench the matter should be referred to a larger bench.

Justice Kurian Joseph agreed and made some sharp remarks

"I don't want to remain silent on this issue. There are certain virgin principles which cannot be deviated from. The system exists on these holy principles. This Court should function as one institution"

barandbench.com/land-acquisiti…

This Supreme Court Bench, therefore, decided to put on hold its February 8 judgment by directing the High Courts not to decide any case relating to interpretation of Section 24 of the Land Acquisition Act, 2013.

barandbench.com/land-acquisiti…

After this eventful hearing, the very next day, that is February 22, 2018 more land acquisition matters came up before two Division Benches, one headed by Justice Arun Mishra and the other by Justice AK Goel, the two judges who had rendered majority judgment in Indore Development

Both the Benches directed that the matter be placed before the Chief Justice for constituting appropriate Bench. barandbench.com/section-24-lan…

All these matters were then listed before a Constitution Bench and came up for hearing on March 6, 2018. The Constitution Bench headed by then CJI Dipak Misra said that it will hear the matter.
barandbench.com/constitution-b…

However, that Bench broke before the matter could be heard and CJI Dipak Misra retired from office.

Nearly a year later, a new notification was published stating that a Constitution bench will sit from March 27, 2019 to hear five cases one of which was the case of Indore Development Authority. barandbench.com/constitution-b…

This Constitution Bench comprised Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi and Justices NV Ramana, DY Chandrachud, Deepak Gupta, and Sanjiv Khanna. barandbench.com/constitution-b…

However, that combination of Judges was unable to assemble after the first week of April this year and thus, these cases were placed before the newly formed five-Judge Bench headed by Justice Arun Mishra. barandbench.com/constitution-b…

This has led to a new controversy since Justice Arun Mishra will now be heading the Bench which will decide the correctness of his own judgment in Indore Development Authority. It has led to objections from various quarters with farmers group writing to the CJI.

Besides this, there was another controversy in the matter which went largely unnoticed.

The Indore Development Authority judgment had a dissenting opinion – by Justice M Shantanagoudar.

Though Justice Mohan Shantanagoudar had sided with the majority judges with respect to five questions decided in the dispute, he had dissented with respect to the question of correctness of the judgment in Pune Municipal Corporation v. Harakchand Misirimal Solanki.

However, when the judgment was uploaded on the website of the Supreme Court of India, the dissenting opinion of Justice Shantanagoudar was missing.

A number of private law journals and publications including Bar & Bench had reported the said case without the judgment of Justice Shantanagoudar, as it was not uploaded on the website initially. However, the dissenting opinion appeared on the website subsequently.

The fact that a number of private law journals did not publish the dissenting opinion did not go down well with the Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court proceeded to issue a circular to a list of law journals asking them to publish the dissenting judgment along with the majority opinion. barandbench.com/exclusive-just…

The Court also asked law journals to publish a corrigendum, and also cautioned them against making such omissions/lapses in future – all this despite the fact that dissenting judgment was not uploaded on the Supreme Court website initially.