Once possession of the land is taken, it vests in the State, and the landowner ceases to have any right over the land. Section 101A of the Act, 2013 is an enabling provision for the State and does not confer any legal right on the individual landowner to approach the State for de-notification.

JUDGMENT

Daya Chaudhary, J. - By this order, both the civil miscellaneous applications, detailed above, shall be disposed of as common issue is involved in the same. However, the facts are being extracted from CM No.9051 of 2020 in CWP No.22241 of 2016.

2. Applicants-petitioners filed CWP No.22241 of 2016 before this Court with the prayer that compulsory acquisition proceedings notified vide notification dated 02.01.2002 (Annexure P-4) issued under Section 4, followed by declaration dated 24.12.2002 (Annexure P-5) issued under Section 6 of the Act and Award dated 21.12.2004 (Annexure P-6) under Section 11 of the Land Acquisition Act, 1894 shall be deemed to have been lapsed in view of provisions of Section 24(2) of the Right to Fare Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013 (for short - "the Act, 2013") as amended upto date.

3. Notice of motion was issued on 25.10.2016 and thereafter, case was adjourned on various dates. During pendency of the main writ petition, two civil miscellaneous application bearing CM Nos. 9051 and 9059 of 2020 have been moved for withdrawal of CWPs No.22241 and 22247 of 2016, respectively with liberty to approach the respondent-State by way of filing representation under Section 101A of the Act, 2013 for de-notifying their land.

4. Mr. Shailendra Jain, learned Senior Counsel for the applicants-petitioners submits that he may be allowed to withdraw said two petitions with liberty to approach respondent-State by way of filing representation under Section 101A of the Act, 2013 as granted in other cases of similar nature i.e. CWPs No.22948 of 2014, 2115 of 2016, 5652 and 15297 of 2017, 327 of 2018 and 569 of 2020. He further submits that similar applications were moved before this Court and those petitions were allowed to be withdrawn with liberty as prayed for in the applications.

5. Learned Senior counsel for the petitioners further submits that Section 101A of the Act, 2013 came by virtue of Section 5 of the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement (Haryana Amendment) Act, 2017 (for short - "the Act, 2017") enabling the State to de-notify the already acquired land in case the 'public purpose' for which the land was acquired under the Land Acquisition Act, 1894 becomes unviable or non-essential. Section 101A was inserted w.e.f. 24.05.2018 by virtue of notification and it has been deemed to come into force w.e.f. 01.01.2014. Said writ petitions were filed in the year 2016. He further submits that Section 101A of the Act, 2013 appears to be similar to Section 48 of the Land Acquisition Act, 1894 (for short - "the Act, 1894")but said two provisions operate in different situations as Section 48 of the Act, 1894 deals with withdrawal of the land acquisition proceedings by the State Government in case the possession has not been taken under Section 16 or 17 (1) thereof. Section 101A of the Act, 2013 deals with restitution of land to the owners when land had been taken way back and has vested in the State Government free from all encumbrances. Prior to insertion of Section 101 A, in case the notified land had been taken in possession by the Collector and it vested in the State Government free from all encumbrances and there could not be any exercise of power to restitute the same back to the land owners from whom the same was acquired. Section 101A of the Act had been introduced in order to overcome such difficulty. The State Government has now vested with a power by virtue of Section 101A of the Act, 2013 to restitute even such land had been vested with the State, even after taking possession of the land. Learned Senior Counsel also submits that liberty is being sought as a matter of caution to enable the petitioners not to be precluded from filing petitions for having benefit of Section 101A of the Act. Learned Senior Counsel also submits that in case liberty is not granted, the petitioners will have to