Carrying out improvements on a road system amounts to construction of works within the meaning of Section 5(3) of the Requisitioned Land (Continuance of Powers) Act, 1947.

( 1 ) THIS appeal involves what ultimately boiled down to a short point.

( 2 ) IT appears that on 19-2-1945, the then Government of Bengal, acting on behalf of the Government of India, requisitioned the road system lying on premises No. 22, Dover Lane. They also requisitioned by notifications issued on the same date the building sites comprised within the same premises, which had previously been sold out to as many as fifty-three persons. The previous history of the plot of land is that it belonged to a concern, called the Regent Estates Limited. In 1940, Messrs Talbot and Company, acting on behalf of the Regent Estates Limited, submitted plans to the Corporation of Calcutta in respect of this plot wherein the land was shown as divided into several plots and a sewer and road system was also shown. The Corporation appears to have told the representatives of the owners that they would sanction the plans if a small strip of land lying on the northern extrimity was also acquired. That strip of land was a drain belonging to the Corporation. The owners accepted that suggestion and on 18-5-1944, they purchased the strip of land concerned. On 28-6-1944, possession of that strip of land was given to the Regent Estates Limited for the purpose of constructing a gully pit through which the water of adjoining premises might be let out. Thereafter, the owners constructed roads and drains, effected electrical installations, divided the area into a number of plots and sold them to various purchasers.

( 3 ) IT was at the aforesaid stage that the requisition orders were made. There is some obscurity as to whether there was a single requisition on 19-2-1945, by which, not only the roads lying over premises 22 Dover Lane, but also the land comprised within the premises were requisitioned. Paragraph 9 of the petition by which the present proceeding was initiated would suggest that only one requisition was made. That however is misleading. It appears sufficiently from the facts stated by the learned Judge and accepted by him that before the requisition was made, the building sites had already been sold out to different purchasers, with the result that the Regent Estates Limited had been left with the ownership of only the road system. What the requisition authority did was to issue separate requisition notices to the different purchasers in respect of the plots purchased by them, because of those plots they were the owners --and a separate notice to the Regent Estates Limited in respect of the road system which still remained their property. I am mentioning this fact, because the main argument advanced on behalf of the petitioner-appellant was constructed on the circumstance that there was a separate notice limited to the road-system only.

( 4 ) IN the meantime, the Corporation had been approached for taking over the road system, but the order of requisition had intervened and by that order the Regent Estates Limited had been prohibited from disposing of the roads without the permission of the Land Acquisition Collector. The Land Acquisition Collector was therefore approached for permission to make over the roads to the Corporation and he granted such permission on 18-5-1945, subject to the condition that the requisition by Government would not in any manner be prejudicially affected. The Corporation took over possession of the road system on 25-9-1945, and by a notification, duly published, declared the roads to be public roads.

( 5 ) GOVERNMENT, after requisitioning the lands and the road system in the manner I have just recited, proceeded to build staff quarters upon the premises for the use and occupation of Government personnel. Between 1945 and 1951, there appears to have been a considerable amount of constructive activity resulting in the erection of a fairly large number of buildings. It is said that during that period or a part of it, public use of the roads was not objected to or interfered with.

( 6 ) ON 21-3-19