United by a common purpose

United by a common purpose

Context:

• The Constitution Bench in the land acquisition case must show us that the court still respects rules of precedent

Provision in Land Act:

• A provision in the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013 (LARR Act) is being replaced the Land Acquisition Act of 1894.
• As a result, landowners were placed at the state’s mercy.
• Government was accorded vast discretion to expropriate land for supposed public use.
• Requirements of due process were scant, and the amount of money paid in return for land was often derisory, that too in the rare cases where it could be grasped from the exchequer’s strong hands.
• But it is also to be remembered that the number of safeguards that the law legislates has made the process of acquisition manifestly fairer.
• For instance, it compels a social and environmental impact assessment as a precondition for any acquisition.
• Besides, it also acknowledges a need for a system of rehabilitation and resettlement for those whose livelihoods are likely to be affected by the transfer of land.

Background:

• Ordinarily, the court held that the state is always obligated to pay the landowner money in terms of any award made.
• It was only in exceptional circumstances, defined in Section 31 of the 1894 statute, that the government could deposit those amounts into a court of law.
• These included cases where a landowner might have refused to receive compensation, for some reason or the other.
• But even there, a mere payment into the government’s own treasury wouldn’t suffice.
• Therefore, the proceedings in all these cases under the 1894 law, the bench ruled, had to be annulled, with lands being returned to their original owners.
• High Courts across India almost uniformly adopted this verdict, reversing acquisitions in a host of cases.

A different reading:

• On February 8, a divided three-judge bench departed from the decision in Pune Municipality.
• It has been found that in cases where a landowner refuses compensation, a payment into the government’s treasury was sufficient, and that there was no attendant obligation on the state to deposit this money into court.
• This reading clearly fits neither with the language of the LARR Act nor the law’s larger objectives.
• What makes the ruling patently unconscionable, though, is that it roundly disregards Pune Municipal Corporation, holding that the bench there showed a lack of due regard for the law.
• Stare decisis, a principle foundational to the judiciary’s effective functioning, is predicated on a belief that settled points of law ought not to be disturbed.
• The idea is that a court’s rulings should represent a consistent position.
• If judges are allowed to easily depart from precedent, citizens might find themselves in an impossible position, where the statement of law remains prone to the constant vagaries of human interpretation.

Maintaining uniformity in Supreme Court’s decisions:

• In India, since the Supreme Court declares the law for the whole country, ensuring uniformity in its decisions is especially critical.
• Therefore, to ensure that its decisions remain predominantly consistent, the court has carved out rules that make its judgments binding on all benches of the court of an equal or lesser strength.
• The court held that a three-judge bench cannot overrule a precedent set by an earlier bench of equal strength, but must, in cases where it thinks the previous bench might have blundered, refer the dispute to the Chief Justice, seeking the creation of a larger panel.
• Maintaining such a rule not only ensures stability in the court’s rulings but also provides the court with the necessary flexibility to correct its errors in appropriate cases.