After 30-year legal battle, SC asks Andhra to pay Rs 70 lakh compensation to landowners

New Delhi: After a nearly 30-year legal battle, a group of private landowners were on Monday granted Rs 70 lakh as compensation by the Supreme Court from the Andhra Pradesh government for dispossessing them of their over 3.34 acres of land in Kurnool district.

Observing that “the purpose of law is the advancement of justice”, the top court was critical of the non-serious approach of state authorities in responding to the legal notices issued to them by private persons in land disputes.

The court said it could have directed the state authorities to put the appellants back in possession of the land but it was too late in the day to pass such a decree because the construction was completed 30 years back. “We make it abundantly clear that the public authorities must take statutory notice issued to them in all seriousness. The public authorities must not sit over such notices and force the citizens to the vagaries of litigation,” said a bench comprising Justices J B Pardiwala and R Mahadevan.

The judgement came from the bench on a long-standing land dispute between Yerikala Sunkalamma and others (appellants) and the state of Andhra Pradesh.

The appellants claimed that in 1995, they were unlawfully dispossessed from their land without any prior notice by the state authorities and a civil lawsuit was filed in 1996 at a lower court seeking a declaration of their title over the land.

The trial court decreed the suit in favour of private landowners declaring them to be the lawful owners and asked the state government to deliver the possession back to them.

However, the Andhra Pradesh government challenged this ruling in the High Court at Hyderabad, which set aside the trial court’s order in 2014, citing the appellants’ failure to prove their title and asserting that the land was government-assigned property.

Following this, the appellants approached the top court which reviewed the matter extensively. The apex court criticised the state authorities for failing to communicate their stance in response to statutory notices issued by the appellants.

Justice Pardiwala, emphasised that public authorities must not force citizens into prolonged litigation by ignoring statutory notices. The bench acknowledged the appellants’ claim over the land. However, it said that restoration was unfeasible given that construction on the disputed land had been completed nearly three decades ago and directed the state government to compensate the appellants monetarily instead.

The top court, in its verdict, referred to earlier judgement and said, “Suits for declaration of title against the government differ from suits against private parties on two counts …First, there is a presumption in favour of the Government in such suits, as all lands which are unoccupied or not vested in any individual or local authority, are presumed to belong exclusively to the Government.

“Secondly, there is an additional burden of proof on the party seeking the declaration of title against the Government. The plaintiff has to establish its possession over the land in question for a period of thirty years as opposed to 12 years in the case of adverse possession against a private party…”.