Bilaspur: The High Court of Chhattisgarh has reduced the compensation awarded in a land acquisition dispute involving South Eastern Coalfields Limited (SECL), while setting aside a direction to consider a job claim. The judgment was delivered by a Division Bench of Chief Justice Ramesh Sinha and Justice Ravindra Kumar Agrawal.
The case relates to Mahendra Kumar Sahu, who had bought about 1.21 acres of land in Govindpur village in 1993. Later, SECL acquired the land for mining and paid him ₹31,291 as compensation in 2002. Sahu then applied for a job under the rehabilitation policy, which is meant to support people whose land is acquired.
However, SECL rejected his request, saying he had purchased the land after the cut-off date of September 30, 1991, and therefore was not eligible. Earlier, a Single Judge of the High Court had ruled in Sahu’s favour. The court had said the rejection was not legally valid, asked SECL to consider giving him a job, and awarded ₹10 lakh as compensation, noting that he had been fighting the case for years.
SECL challenged this order before a Division Bench. After hearing both sides, the court noted that there was no dispute that Sahu owned the land and that it had been acquired legally. The main question was whether he could claim a job despite buying the land after the cut-off date.
The court found that the cut-off date rule was based on an internal decision that was never made public. Because of this, the court said it could not be used to deny benefits to someone. At the same time, during the hearing, Sahu said he no longer wanted a job and would accept fair compensation instead.
Taking this into account, the court decided to settle the matter by awarding compensation instead of directing employment. However, it reduced the amount from ₹10 lakh to ₹5 lakh, saying the earlier amount was too high, especially since there was no clear wrongdoing by SECL.
The court ordered SECL to pay ₹5 lakh within 30 days. With this, the case has been partly allowed and the long-running dispute has come to an end.
Case Details : South Eastern Coalfields Ltd. and Another vs Mahendra Kumar Sahu and Others