ORDER

1. Leave granted.

2. This appeal is filed against the judgment and order dated 3rd of October, 2007 passed in Writ Appeal No. 834 of 2007 whereby the High Court had dismissed the appeal of the appellants holding that in the facts and circumstances of the case, the power under Section 17 of the Land Acquisition Act (in short the "Act") was validly invoked.

3. Before we proceed further, we may note that at the time of issuing notice on the respondents, this Court on 14th of December, 2007 passed the following order :-

"Issue notice. Status quo as on today shall be maintained."

4. An application for vacating the interim order was listed for hearing on 16th of July, 2008 and the learned counsel appearing for the parties submitted before us, on instructions, that instead of hearing out the application for vacating the interim order, it would be fit and proper if the Special Leave Petition itself was decided. Accordingly, with the consent of the learned counsel for the parties, the SLP itself was taken up for hearing which was heard on grant of leave in presence of learned counsel for the parties.

5. The appellants are owners of Sy Nos. 172/1A, 2A, 2B and 173/2 totaling 18.5 Acres situated at Almel Village Sindagi Taluk in the State of Karnataka. During the year 1962, due to over flow of Bhima river, Tharapura village was submerged. The State Government acquired about 14 Acres of land in Sy No. 188, 189 and 190/2 of Almel Village in order to rehabilitate the families of Tharapura village which was submerged by the over flow of Bhima river. On the said acquired lands, the State Government had rehabilitated 85 families of Tharapura village whereas 145 families of the said village were still not rehabilitated. It is not in dispute that after rehabilitating 85 families as stated hereinabove on the aforesaid acquired lands, another 145 families still were residing in the Tharapura village including the appellants. In the year 1994, technical sanction was given for the Bhima Lift Irrigation Project. Accordingly, sanction was accorded to construct a barrage on the Bhima river, for which final sanction was given in the financial year 2003-2004. Thereafter, construction work began and this project was aimed to extend irrigation facilities to 24,200 hectares of land. As a result of the detailed technical status, it was found that the project, i.e., Bhima Irrigation Project, would result in the complete submergence of Tharapura village owing to water spread when the barrage is commissioned. For this reason, it was found imperative and absolutely necessary to evacuate the villagers still staying in Tharapura village. Accordingly, before commissioning the barrage, decision was taken to rehabilitate another 145 families of Tharapura village in some other area.

6. It is not in dispute that construction work of the barrage is ready for operation. At this stage, it was thought proper to rehabilitate 145 families, for which lands were sought to be acquired. Under these circumstances, the commissioning of the barrage on the Bhima river could not be started although it was completed because the 145 families in the said village could not be shifted. To meet this problem, the notification under Section 4(1) of the Act was issued on 10th of August, 2006 for acquiring the lands of the appellants namely, Sy Nos. 172/1A, 2A, 2B and 173/2 totaling 18.5 Acres.

7. This notification was under challenge before the High Court by way of a writ application, which was dismissed by a learned Single Judge of the High Court and the said order was affirmed by a Division Bench of the High Court. The orders of the High court are now under challenge before us in appeal. The learned senior counsel appearing on behalf of the appellants, Mr. Vasudev substantially raised the submission before us that since the rehabilitation project was pending since 1962, the emergency power under Section 17 of the Act, could not have been exercised by the State Government in the year 2006.