AKIL KURESHI, J.

1. This group of petitions is filed by individual land owners or occupiers whose lands are acquired by the Railway Ministry for the purpose of laying down the railway tracks for Dedicated Freight Corridor.

2. We may record basic facts from Special Civil Application No. 12438 of 2012. Petitioners herein are owners of various agricultural as well as non-agricultural lands situated in village Sardarpur, Dist: Banaskantha. In exercise of powers under Section 2 (37A) of the Railways Act, 1989, the Central Government issued a notification dated 19.02.2008 notifying the Western Dedicated Freight Corridor as a special railway project. The project entails laying down of railway tracks specially dedicated to a freight corridor between Mumbai and New Delhi.

2.1 On 10.02.2009, a notification was published under subsection (1) of Section 20A of the Act declaring certain lands specified in the schedule to the notification as lands required for execution, maintenance, management and operation of the said special railway project. These included the lands situated in Akesan, Chadotar, Parpada and Moriya villages of Palanpur but did not include the lands of any of the petitio