The requisition of land for the purpose of constructing a police station is a purpose connected with or incidental to the purposes mentioned in Section 3(1) of the West Bengal Land (Requisition and Acquisition) Act, 1948.

( 1 ) THIS application is at the instance of the petitioner who is one of the co-owners of the plots Nos. 13851 and 13852 of khatian No. 4494, mouza Behala challenging the validity of the notice of requisition issued under Section 3 of the West Bengal Act II of 1948 i. e. West Bengal Land (Requisition and Acquisition) Act, 1948 whereby these lands along with other plots of lands were notified for requisition for public purposes mentioned in the said notice at annexure A to the petition on the ground that the land in question purported to be requisitioned for a purpose were being utilised for another purpose viz. for construction of Behala Police Station which has been demolished on account of widening of the Diamond Harbour Road.

( 2 ) THE facts in brief are as follows. The aforesaid plots of lands along with other lands were notified for requisition under Section 3 (1) of the said Act for the purposes viz. for widening Diamond Harbour Road at Behala and also for maintaining supplies and services essential to the life of the community and/or for providing proper facilities for transport, communication, etc. This requisition notice was served admittedly in 1974 and thereafter the work was taken up for widening the road and the Diamond Harbour Road was completed also long before. The petitioner has stated that when the authorities concerned came to implement the requisition notice in respect of these particular lands of the petitioner and his co-owners they raised objection and thereafter they have come before this Court with the instant writ application on 26-6-81.

( 3 ) A Rule was issued and an interim order was made restraining the respondents from proceeding any further on the basis of the notice which has been annexed as annexure A to the petition for a period of two weeks with liberty to pray for extension of the interim order on notice to the respondents on the same application. On 24-11-81 after hearing the learned Advocates for both the parties the interim order was vacated. Then an application for restoration was filed and that was heard on 9-12-81. The application for restoration was however not allowed.

( 4 ) MR. Mitra, learned Advocate appearing on behalf of the petitioner, has made a twofold submission before this court. His first submission is that the concerned authorities cannot proceed to construct buildings on the lands in question for the purpose of accommodating the Behala Police Station which is not a purpose mentioned in the notice of requisition. In other words, Mr. Mitra has contended that the action of the respondents is wholly arbitrary, illegal and bad inasmuch as they purport to use the land for a purpose other than that mentioned in the requisition notice. In support of this, submission Mr. Mitra cited a decision. Mr. Mitra next submitted that in the impugned notice only one purpose was mentioned i. e. for widening Diamond Harbour Road and as such the land in question cannot be used for purposes not mentioned therein. It has been also submitted by Mr. Mitra that the notice was served only on the petitioner who is admittedly one of the owners of these two plots and as such the petitioner alone has come up before this Court to assail the said notice without impleading the other co-owners of the said lands. This non-impleading the other co-owners according to the submission of Mr. Mitra does not in any way invalidate the instant writ application. Mr. Mitra further submitted that there is delay in moving this application undoubtedly but the petitioner immediately when the respondents tried to implement the order came up before this Court and as such this should be considered and the application should not be rejected on the ground of delay.

( 5 ) MR. Amar Nath Banerjee, learned Advocate appearing on behalf of the State, has, on the other hand, submitted that this application should be rejected on the ground of inordinate delay in coming up before this jurisdiction to challeng