DELHI DEVELOPMENT AUTHORITYversusREENA SURI AND ORS.

                           [2016] 2 S.C.R. 396



A               DELHI DEVELOPMENT AUTHORITY
                                   v.
                       REENA SURI AND ORS.
                   (Civil Appeal No. 4544 of2016 etc.)
B                           APRIL 28, 2016
    [KURIAN JOSEPH AND ROHINTON FALi NARIMAN, JJ.)
         Land Acquisition Act, 1894 - ss. JI and 16 - Land acquisition
  proceedings under the Act - Award passed u/s. I I - But possession
C of the land not taken by the State - Whether such proceedings would
  lapse - Held: Such proceedings would lapse in view of s. 24(2) of
  the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land
  Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013 - Jn view of
  s.16 of 1894 Act, passing of award by itself would not mean that
  the land automatically vested with the Government - Right to Fair
D Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation
  and Resettlement Act, 2013 - s.24(2).
         Dismissing the appeals, the Court
         HELD: 1. Under Section 24(2) of the Right to Fair
E Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition,
  Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013, the proceedings
  initiated under the Land Acquisition Act, 1894 and culminating
  in award under Section 11 of the 1894 Act would lapse, in case
  the possession after passing of the award has not been taken
  within five years or more prior to the commencement of the 2013
F Act. Under.Section 24(2) of the 2013 Act, the proceedings would
  also lapse in case the compensation has not been paid to the
  owners of the land before 01.01.2014 (the date, the 2013 Act
  came into force. [Para 3) [399-E-F)
        2. Under s. 16 of Lar.d Acquisition Act, -1894, once an award
G has been made by the Collector under Section 11 of the 1894
  Act, the Collector .has to take possession of the land and only
  thereupon, the land will vest in the Government free from all
  encumbrances. Therefore, passing of the award by itself will not
  enable the appellant to take a contention that the land has

H                                  396
    DELHI DEVELOPMENT AUTHORITY v. REENA SURI                               397


automatically vested with the Government on passing of the award.            A
[Para 6) (400-A-C)
      3. In the present cases,' the land bas not been taken
possession of by the Collector within five years or more prior to
01.01.2014 when the 2013 Act came into force. The High Court
bas rightly held that the land acquisition proceedings bas lapsed            B
in view of Section 24 of 2013 Act. [Paras 2 and i] [398-B-F; 400..
C-D)
     CIVIL APPELLATE JURISDICTION : Civil Appeal No. 4544
of2016
      From the Judgment and Order dated 12.01.2015 of the High Court         c
of Delhi at New Delhi in WP (C) No. 6698 of2014.
                                 WITH
      C. A. NOS. 4545, 4546, 4547, 4548, 4549, 4550, 4552, 4553, 4554,
45S5, 4556, 4557, 4558, 4559, 4560, 4561, 4562, 4563, 4564, 4565, 4566,
4567, 4568, 4569, 4570, 4571, 4572, 4573, 4574, 4575, 4576, 4577, 4578,      D
4579, 4580, 4581, 4582, 4583, 4584, 4585, 4586, 4587, 4588, 4589, 4590,
4591, 4592, 4593, 4594, 4595, 4596, 4597, 4598, 4599, 4600 AND 460 I
of2016
       V. Giri, Sr. Adv., Sanchar Anand, AAG, Anil Kaushik, Ro hit Singh,
Ms. Arunima Dwivedi, E. C. Agrawala, Cagan Gupta, Govind Goel, Ms.           E
Garima Prashad, G. Balaji, Ms. Shiva Vijaya Kumar, Apoorv Singhal,
Devendra Singh, Shantanu Krishna, Vishnu B. Saharya, Viresh B.
Saharya, (for M/s Saharya & Co;); Ashwani Kumar, Rahul Bhatia, Manish
Kumar, Ms. Divya Roy, S. Anand, Devender Singh, Ms. Binu Tamta,
Ms. Nikita Shrivastava, Dhruv Tamta, Shantanu Sagar, Advs., with them        F
for the Appellant.·
      Ms. Pinky Anand, ASG, A.K. Sanghi, Ajit Sinha, Ravinder Sethi,
Ms. Vibha Dutta Makhija, Sr. Advs. R.K. Rathore, Vibhu Shankar Mishra,
Mrs. Samta P. Mis.hra, S.A. Haseeb, Umesh Babu Chaurasia, Neeraj
Kumar Sharma, R.S. Nagar, Ajay Kumar Singh, Harish Kumar K.,
Shailender Saini, SarfrazA. Siddiqui, Ms. Satya Siddiqui, R.K. Mohanty,      G
Ranjit Kr. Jha, D.S. Mahra, Manish K. Bishnoi, Venkat Poonia, Raj iv
Kumar Ghawana, Puneet Sharma, Ajay Sharma, Rajeev Sharma, Ms.
Neelam Sharma, Gopal Shankarnarayanan, Mahesh Agrawal, Ankur
Saigal, Rishabh Parikh, VivekJain, Ms. Devika Mohan, Ms. Zeeshan
                                                                             H
398            SUPREME COURT REPORTS                       [2016] 2 S.C.R.


A  Diwan, Ms. !ti Sharma, Ms. C. Mandakini, Ms. Priya Puri, Ms. Esha
   Mazumdar, Setu Niket, Priyanjali Singh, B.S. Mathur, Bharat Bhushan
   Jain, S.Anand, ApoorvaSinghal, Devender Singh, Kaushik Poddar, Rajat
   Mathur, Ms. Smita Maan, Vishal Mann, Naresh Maan, Satyawan Rathi,
   Bankey Bihari, Shiv Kumar Suri, Shikhil Suri, S.K. Rout, Sumeer Sodhi,
   Varun Tankha, Amitabh Sinha, Arjun Nanda, Praval Arora, T. Mahipal,
 B
   Anil Kaushik, Ms. Arunima Dwivedi, Anurag Singh, Harish K. Ms.
   Rashmi Malhotra, Neeraj K. Sharma, Neeraj Shekhar, Animesh Singh,
   Ashutosh Thakur, Pradeep Misra, Daleep Dhyani, Suraj Singh, Manoj
   Kumar Sharma, N.S. Vasisht, Vishal Singh, Ms. Jyoti Kataria, M.P.
   Bhargava, Bharat Beriwal, Raj iv Ranjan Dwivedi, Harish Pandey, S.K.
 C Verma, Subhash Kamboj, Abhimanyu, Sum it Bansal, Ateev Mathur, Ms.
   Richa Oberoi, A.P.S. Saigal, Vikas Kumar, Atul Kumar, R.K. Rathore,
   ShadmanAli,Ajay Kr. Singh, Harish Kr. Khinchi, Ms. Kiran Bharadwaj,
   Ms. Gunwant Dara, Ms. Sunita Sharma, Ms. Sushma Suri, Ranjeet
   Kumar Jha, Rohtas Nagar, Ms. Rachna Srivastava, Ms. Monika,
   Anshuman Srivastava, A. Deb Kumar, P. K. Biswal, Advs., with them
 D
   for the Respondent~. _. __
           The Judgment of the Court was delivered by
           KURIAN, J. I. Leave granted.
           2. All these appeals have been filed by the Delhi Development
 E Authority, aggrieved by the Judgment of the High Court of Delhi. In
     the impugned Judgment, the High Court has taken the stand that the
     land acquisition initiated under the Land Acquisition Act, 1894, and
     culminating in passing of awards on different dates, has lapsed in view
     of Section 24 of The Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in
     Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013 (in short,
 F - "2013 Act") in respect of the land covered by these appeals. Section
     24 of the Act reads as follows:-
           "24. Land acquisition process under Act No. 1 of 1894 shall be
           deemed to have lapsed in certain cases - (I) Notwithstanding
           anything contained in this Act, in any case of land acquisition
 G         proceedings initiated under the Land Acquisition Act, 1894,-
           (a) where no award under section 11 of the said Land Acquisition
           Act has been made, then, all provisions of this Act relating to the
           determination of compensation shall apply; or
            (b) where an award under said section 11 has been made,
            then such proceedings shall continue under the provisions of
 H
    DELHI DEVELOPMENT AUTHORITY v. REENA SURI                                  399
                   [KURIAN, J.]

      the said Land Acquisition Act, as ifthe said Act has not been             A
      repealed.
      (2) Notwithstanding anything contained in sub-section ( 1), in case
      of land acquisition proceedings initiated under the Land
      Acquisition Act. 1894, where an award under the said seetion 11
      has been made five years or more prior to the commencement                B
      of this Act but the physical possession of the land has not been
      taken or the compensation has not been paid the ·said
      proceedings shall be deemed to have lapsed and the appropriate
      Government, if it so chooses, shall initiate the proceedings of such
      land acquisition afresh in accordance with the provisions of this
      Act:                                                                      c
      Provided that where an award has been made and compensation
      in respect of a majority ofland holdings has not been deposited
      in the account of the beneficiaries, then, all beneficiaries specified
      in the notification for acquisition under section 4 of the said
      Land Acquisition Act, shall be entitled to eompensation in                D
      accordance with the provisions of this Act"
       3. It may be seen that under Section 24(2) of the Act, the
proceedings initiated under the LandAcquisitionAct, 1894 and culminating
in award under Section 11 of the said Act would lapse in case the
possession, after passing of the award has not been taken within five
years or more prior to the commencement of the 2013 Act (9 of2014).
This Act came into force on 01.01.2014. Under Section 24 (2) of the
2013 Act, the proceedings would also lapse in case the compensation
has not been paid to the owners of the land before 01.01.2014. However,
it is made clear under Section 24(2) of the 2013 Act that despite such
                                                                                F
]apse, it will be open to the appropriate Government to initiate fresh
proceedings for acquisition in accordance with the provisions of the 2013
Act.
      4. Sh. Vishnu Saharya, learned counsel appearing forthe appellant-
Delhi Development Authority, has submitted that once an award has
been passed, the property vests in the Government and, therefore, there
is no lapse. We are afraid, the contentions raised by him cannot be
appreciated.
      5. Section 16 of the Land Acquisition Act, 1894 reads as
follows:-
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400              SUPREME COURT REPORTS                         [2016] 2 S.C.R.


A            "Power to take possession - When the Collector has made an
           · award under Section 11, he may take possession of the land,
             which shall thereupon [vest absolutely in the [Government]], free
             from all encumbrances."
             6. Under the above provision, once an award has been made
 B    by the Collector under Section 11 of the Act, 1894, the Collector has
      to take possession of the land and only thereupon, the land will vest
      in the Government free from all encumbrances. Therefore, passing of
      the award by itself will not enable the appellant to take a contention
      that the land has automatically vested with the Government on passing
      of the award.
c
            7. It is not in dispute that in all these cases, the land has not been
      taken possession of by the Collector within five years or more prior to
      01.01.2014 when the 2013 Act came into force.
            8. In that view of the matter, there is no merit in these appeals.
D     The appeals are, accordingly, dismissed.
            No costs.
      Kalpana K. Tripathy                                       Appeals dismissed.