State took land but didn't pay compensation for 50 years; Andhra Pradesh HC orders payment
The Andhra Pradesh High Court has ordered the state government to compensate a woman for land acquired in 1976 after discovering she never received the payment. The court ruled that the state has a fundamental duty to ensure compensation reaches the landowner after an acquisition.
Why it matters
This case highlights issues of bureaucratic negligence and the importance of judicial oversight in protecting property rights against state acquisition.
NEW DELHI: The Andhra Pradesh high court has directed state authorities to pay a 72-year-old woman land compensation that was awarded way back in 1976, after finding that the money never actually reached her, even though it was fixed nearly five decades ago.Justice B. Krishna Mohan said that even though the government had worked out and set aside the compensation amount at the time, simply passing an award is not enough and the state also has a duty to actually pay the money to the landowner.Why were landowners waiting 50 years for compensation?The petitioner, Kunisetty Hymavathy, had bought around 5 acres of land in Martur village, Prakasam district, through three registered sale deeds in 1973. She and her husband later moved to Chennai, then Visakhapatnam, and then Vijayawada for work, before finally returning to Guntur. Her husband died in 2006.
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