The main legal point established in the judgment is that the acquisition of lands for a public purpose, followed by substantial transfers to a private individual, constitutes a fraud on power and is invalid.

( 1 ) ALL these four appeals can be dealt with under a common judgment. They arise out of the judgment of Justice murlidher rao dated 20-7-1987 in W. P. nos. 10881 to 10882/1987 and 10895 and 10896/1987.

( 2 ) WHAT are challenged in these appeals are land acquisition proceedings taken under the Land Acquisition Act, 1894, (Central Act No. 1 of 1894), (hereinafter referred to as 'the act' ).

( 3 ) WE will now proceed to state the facts :lands involved in these four appeals respectively are: sy. No. 139 of kodihalli measuring 1 acre, sy. No. 17 of challaghatta measuring 2 acres 38 guntas + 38 guntas pk, sy. No. 140 of kodihalli measuring 3 acres and sy. No. 144 of kodihalli measuring 1 acre 1 gunta + 1 gunta pk. Notification under Section 4 (1) of the act (preliminary notification) was made on 29-12-1981. That was published in the Karnataka gazette on 7-1-1982. The preamble of the notification requires to be extracted because that evidences the public purpose, and it reads :"whereas it appears to the special deputy commissioner, Bangalore district, that the lands specified in the schedule hereto are likely to be needed for the public purpose to wit, for golf cum hotel resort near Bangalore airport, Bangalore. " (emphasis supplied) we may at once state that though under the Central Act, the satisfaction for issue of Section 4 (1) notification is to be that of the state government, as regards Karnataka state is concerned by reason of Karnataka Act 17 of 1961 that satisfaction is to be arrived it by the deputy commissioner. That is why the above notification states:"whereas it appears to the special deputy commissioner". Leave alone that. On 21-1-1982 the preliminary notification was notified in the village chawadi. On 14-5-1982 copies of the said notification were served on the appellants. Thereafter the statutory enquiry under Section 5-a of the act was held. The Advocate appeared on behalf of the objectors and put forth several objections. Those objections were overruled. Thereafter Section 5-a enquiry report was sent on 5-8-1982. Ultimately the declaration under Section 6 (1) of the act was made on 16-4-1983. That was published in the Karnataka gazette on 16-6-1983. On 18-1-1985, 6-5-1985 and 21-5-1985 time was granted to file claim petition. On 6-7-1985 on the basis of pahani indicating survey numbers as fallow, award enquiry was proceeded with, and then the award was made on 8-5-1986 proposing Rs. 10,49,797-90. The award was approved on 23-9-1986, one day prior to the expiry of the statutory period. At this stage itself we may state that though there is a controversy whether the award came to be published on that day or not, we do not think we should go into that factual controversy because larger issues are involved, which have been argued before us hotly. On 7-7-1987 notice under Section 12 (2) of the act was issued to the claimants. On 13-1-1987 comes an important development as evidenced by Annexure-H concerning these lands. We may extract it in full: meeting regarding challaghatta tank held on 13th jan,, 1987. "members present : 1. Dr. H. G. V. Reddy, I. A. S. (retd.), chairman, Bangalore development authority. 2. Sri bapu heddur shetty, chairman, kstdc. 3. Sri s. r. vijay, i. a. s. , commissioner, Bangalore development authority.

( 4 ) SRI sreenivasan, managing director, kstdc.

( 5 ) SRI dayananda pai, agreement holder. Pursuant to the meeting held on 12th january, 1987 in the committee room of vidhana soudha presided over by the Hon'ble chief minister, the matter relating to the acquisition of approximately 39 acres of land in challaghatta tank bed area in favour of kstdc was discussed. It was agreed that a meeting should be arranged with the power of attorney holder/agreement holder of the lands concerned, where the chairman, bda, chairman, kstdc, commissioner, bda, and m. d. , kstdc should discuss the details and an amicable solution found in order to avoid any further delay in acquiring the lands and p