The land acquisition case, from its origins to its final resolution, is one that can come to be seen as emblematic of Judge Mishra’s time in court, involving property issues, profits for large corporations, and contentious legal reasoning.
On October 23, 2019, Judge Arun Mishra refused to recuse himself from a constitutional court of five judges that was established to decide which of the two previous judgments related to the 2013 Land Acquisition Law was correct.
This Bank of the Constitution would continue, in March 2020, to maintain a 2018 verdict on the matter, which has just been written by Judge Mishra himself.
The case addressed the different interpretations of Section 24 (2) of the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act of 2013.
Section 24 (2) of the 2013 Act details that land acquisition procedures initiated under the old Land Acquisition Act of 1894 will lapse if “compensation has not been paid” to owners within five years .
In January 2014, the then CJI Lodha in the Pune municipality corporation case held that the compensation deposit in the government treasury cannot be considered as the payment made to the land owners.
However, in February 2018, in the case of the Indore Development Authority, a three-judge bench headed by Judge Mishra overturned the 2014 ruling and held that paying money to the government treasury will be sufficient for the process of land acquisition, even if payment has not been made. to the farmer.
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