JUDGMENT

BHAGWATI. J. :— These appeals by special leave and writ petitions represent a last but desperate attempt by the class of landholders in Andhra Pradesh to defeat an agrarian reform legislation enacted by the State for the benefit of the weaker sections of the community. It is indeed a matter of regret that a statute intended to strike at concentration of land in the hands of a few and to act as a great equaliser by reducing inequality in holding of land between the haves and the have-nots should have practically remained unimplemented for a period of over seven years. Unfortunately, this is the common fate of much of our social welfare legislation. We can boast of some of the finest legislative measures calculated to ameliorate the socio-economic conditions of the poor and the deprived and to reach social and economic justice to them, but regrettably, a large part of such legislation has remained merely on paper and the benefits of such legislation have not reached the common man to any appreciable extent. The Andhra Pradesh Land Reforms (Ceiling on Agricultural Holdings) Act 1 of 1973 (hereinafter referred to as the Andhra Pradesh Act) which is challenged in the present ap