IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH RFA-176-2000 (O&M)

Date of Decision: 20.02.2026 Smt. Satinder Kaur and others …….Appellants Versus State of Haryana and ors. ..….Respondents CORAM: HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE HARKESH MANUJA Present: Mr.Anand Chhibbar, Sr. Advocate with Mr. Vaibhav Sahni, Advocate for the appellants.

Mr. Abhinash Jain, DAG, Haryana.

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HARKESH MANUJA, J. (ORAL)

By way of filing the present appeal(s) challenge has been laid to the decision dated 13.10.1999 passed by the learned Additional District Judge, Kurukshetra, (hereinafter referred to as ‘the Reference Court’).

3. Briefly stating, some land, situated within the revenue estate of Village Bazidpur, Tehsil Thanesar, District Kurukshetra, was acquired by the Government of Haryana vide notifications dated 09.02.1988 and 16.11.1988, issued under Sections 4 and 6 of the Land Acquisition Act, 1894, for short ‘the Act’ respectively, for public purpose, namely, for ‘preservation of wild life deer park and afforestation in village Bazidpur, Tehsil Thanesar, District Kurukshetra’. The Land Acquisition Collector (for short ‘the LAC’) vide award dated 15.11.1990 assessed market value in respect of the acquired land @ Rs.26,000/- per acre for Chahi land, Rs.19,500/- per acre for Barani land, Rs.13,000/- per acre for Banjar Kadim land and Rs.6500/- per acre for Gair Mumkin land along with solatium @ 30% and 12% additional amount, besides all other statutory benefits under the Act.

4. Dissatisfied with the aforesaid award, the appellants/ landowners preferred reference petitions invoking Section 18 of the Act, which came to be dismissed being barred by limitation vide decision dated 13.10.1999.

5. Aggrieved of the decision of the learned Reference Court, the present appeal was preferred at the instance of appellants/

landowners.

6. I have heard learned counsel for the appellants and gone through the paper-book. I find substance in the submissions made on behalf of the appellants.

7. In the present case, notification under Section 4 of the Act was issued on 09.02.1988 for purpose, namely, for ‘preservation of wild life deer park and afforestation in village Bazidpur, Tehsil Thanesar, District Kurukshetra’’. The award under Section 11 was passed by the LAC on 15.11.1990. In the meanwhile, the original owner Sh.Gurdarshan Singh expired on 15.07.1988. Pleading ignorance to the acquisition proceeding, objections under Section 18 of the Act came to be filed on behalf of the legal representatives of Sh.Gurdarshan Singh on 21.07.1997. The same came to be rejected by the learned Reference Court holding it to be barred by limitation.

Hence, the present appeal.

8. Although, the award dated 15.11.1990 specifically mentions about notice under Section 12(2) of the Act to be served upon the landowners, however, from the entire record and the material available on the file, it cannot be traced out that any such notice under Section 12 (2) of the Act was ever served by the respondents. No such averment even was made by the respondents about service of any notice under Section 12 (2) of the Act upon the appellants/ landowners in their written statement before the learned Reference Court; nor even it was pleaded that the landowner or his heirs were present before the LAC at the time of passing of the Award.

9. In such circumstances, the findings recorded by the learned Reference Court for having dismissed the reference petition preferred at the instance of appellants/ landowners to be barred by limitation were wholly incorrect.

10. Moreover, it has also come on record that the application for release of the amount of compensation in terms of award passed by the LAC was made by the appellants/ landowners only on 13.06.1997 i.e. as soon as they came to know about the acquisition proceedings and admittedly by that time, the compensation amount was not even deposited by the respondents before the learned Reference Court.

11. Furthermore, even no such finding was recorded by the learned Reference