A Land Acquisition Court has jurisdiction to review its own award under Section 141 of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908, and reliance on a non-existent law by the Land Acquisition Judge is a mistake apparent on the face of the record and a sufficient ground for review.

R. BHATTACHARYA, J.:- This is a revisional application under Section 115 of the Code of Civil Procedure filed by the petitioners against the order of the Additional District Judge, First Court, Howrah rejecting the application for review of an Award passed in a reference case sent to the court by the Collector in connection with an acquisition of land.

2. In this case some land was requisitioned for Durgapur-Calcutta Gas-Grid-Project under the provision of Section 3 of the West Bengal Land (Requisition and Acquisition) Act, 1948, (West Bengal Act II of 1948) and the possession of the same was taken on 7th September, 1960. Thereafter, by a Notification under Section 4 of the Act II of 1948, the land was acquired and compensation was granted by the Collector. Being aggrieved at the assessment by the Collector, the claimants prayed for a reference to the Civil Court for enhancement of compensation and other dues as they did not get proper compensation according to their assessment. They valued danga lands at the rate of Rs. 600/-per cottah and the rate for tank was also mentioned in the petition for reference. The reference petition was heard by the learned Additional District Judge and the learned Judge accepted the valuation arrived at by the Collector. During the hearing of the reference certain deeds of conveyance were taken in evidence by both the parties, namely, the claimants and the State of West Bengal. The learned Judge who made the Award in his judgment considered the provisions of the second proviso to Section 7 (1) of the Act II of 1948 and he found that the kobalas exhibited by the claimants could not be comparable units in view of the common features regarding land values and the provisions of the Act, under which the lands were acquired. The grievance of the claimant-petitioners is that in the judgment, the learned Land Acquisition Judge relied upon the second proviso to Section 7 (1) of Act II of 1948 which had previously been struck down and also repealed by an amending Act and that the learned Judge, therefore, had no basis and proper criterion to assess the just valuation of the lands acquired. In this view of the matter a review application was filed. The learned Judge who heard the reference was, in the meantime, transferred and in his place was appointed Mr. A.K. Chatterjee, who disposed of the review application. According to the present Judge of the Land Acquisition Court, the petition was liable to be rejected as the petitioners could have no grievance because his predecessor-in-office dismissed the reference on the view that there was no scaling down to the valuation level of 1948 in the judgment in question, as envisaged in the second proviso to Section 7 (1). According to him, there was no apparent mistake or error on the face of the record.

3. We have heard Mr. Mukherjee, the learned Advocate appearing on behalf of the petitioners and Mr. Basu, the learned Advocate for the State of West Bengal, the opposite party. During the argument of Mr. Basu a point was taken that the application for review was not maintainable according to law, particularly, in view of the provision of Act II of 1948, Admittedly, the land in question was ultimately acquired under the provisions of the West Bengal Land (Requisition and Acquisition) Act, 1948. Section 7 (4) (iii) lays down that where there is the disagreement between the Collector and the person interested in the compensation on the question of the assessment of compensation payable, the matter may be determined by a court under reference according to clause (b) of sub-section (1) of Section 8 of the Act. In Section 8 (2) we find that amongst other sections, Section 26 of the Land Acquisition Act, 1894 will be relevant and applicable according to thus Act. According to Section 26 (2) of the Land Acquisition Act, every Award made by the court shall be deemed to be a decree and the statement of the grounds of every such Award a judgment within the meaning of