The Judgment of the Court was delivered by PATHAK, CJ.
The question of law referred to us for decision in these cases is Whether under the Land Acquisition Act, 1894 as amended by the Land Acquisition Amendment Act, 1984 the claimants are entitled to sola tium at 30 per cent of the market value irre spective of the dates on which the acquisition proceedings were initiated or the dates on which the award had been passed?
It would suffice if we briefly refer to the facts in the Civil Appeals arising out of Special Leave Petitions Nos.
8194 8195 of 1985 Union of India Another v. Raghubir Singh.
The land belonging to the respondents in village Dhaka was taken by companypulsory acquisition initiated by a numberifica tion under s. 4 of the Land Acquisition Act, 1894 issued on 13 November, 1959.
The award with regard to companypensation was made by the Collector on 30 March, 1963.
A reference under s. 18 of the Act was disposed of by the Additional District Judge on 10 June, 1968.
He enhanced the companypensation.
The respondents preferred an appeal to the High Court claiming further companypensation.
During the pendency of the appeal the Land Acquisition Amendment Bill 1982 was introduced in Parliament on 30 April, 1982, and became law as the Land Acquisition Amendment Act, 1984 when it received the assent of the President on 24 September, 1984.
The High Court disposed of the appeal by its Judgment and Order dated 6 December, 1984.
The Judgment and Order of the High Court is the subject of these appeals.
While it raised the rate of companypensation, it also raised the rate of interest payable on the companypensa tion, and taking into account the change in the law effected by the Land Acquisition Amendment Act, 1984 referred to hereinafter as the Amendment Act it awarded solatium at 30 per cent of the market value.
on 23 September, 1985, they referred to two earlier decisions of this Court and expressed the view that the question set forth above required re examination by a larger Bench of five Judges.
v. Special Land Acquisi tion Officer, 1985 1 S.C.C. 582 decided by O. Chinnappa Reddy and Sabyasachi Mukharji, JJ.
When these cases came up before a Bench of two learned Judges S. Venkataramiah and R.B. Misra, JJ.
It was further directed that the other questions involved in the petitions would be companysidered after the aforesaid ques tion had been resolved by the larger Bench.
v. Union Territory of Chandigarh, 1985 3 S.C.C. 737 decided by P.N. Bhagwati, C.J., A.N. Sen and P. Madon, JJ.
The two deci sions referred to in the Order of the learned Judges are K. Kamalajammanniavaru dead by Lrs.
on 14 August, 1985.
on 14 February, 1985 and Bhag Singh and Ors.
From the Judgment and Order dated 6.12.
1984 of the Delhi High Court in R.F.A. Nos.
CIVIL APPELLATE JURISDICTION Civil Appeal Nos.
Parasaran, Attorney General, T.S. Krishnamurthy Iyer, R.L. Iyengar, M.S. Gujaral, F.S. Nariman, A.K. Ganguli, K. Swamy, C.V. Subba Rao, R.D. Agrawala, P. Parmeshwaran, O.P. Sharma, R.C. Gubrele, K.R. Gupta, R.K. Sharma, K.L. Rathee, Chandulal Verma, Subhash Mittal, S. Balakrishnan, N.B. Sinha, K.K. Gupta, Sanjiv B. Sinha, M.M. Kashyap, P.C. Khunger, Swaraj Kaushal, Pankaj Kalra, S.K. Bagga, Ravinder Narain, Sumeet Kachwala, S. Sukumaran, K.R. Nagaraja, S.S. Javali, Ms. Lira Goswami, D.K. Das, B.P. Singh, Ranjit Kumar, Santosh Hegde, N. Shroff, P.N. Misra, D.C. Taneja, P.K. Jena, A.K. Sanghi and M. Veerappa for the appearing parties.
2839 40 of 1989 etc.
113 and 114 of 1968.
