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RETROSPECTIVE EFFECT OF SUCCEEDING CHANGES IN LAW-NOT A VALID GROUND FOR CONDONATION OF DELAY
Recently a bench of 3 Judges the Supreme Court rendered a landmark decision in the case of Delhi Development Authority V. Tejpal & Ors holding that a subsequent change in the law cannot be a valid ground for condonation of delay for submitting an appeal or application. The Delhi Development Authority (“DDA”), the Government of the National Capital Territory of Delhi (“GNCTD”), and the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation Ltd. (“DMRC”), among other government agencies, submitted a number of appeals and review petitions that the court was now considering in the present case.
BACKGROUND
The GNCTD initiated the land acquisition process under the Land Acquisition Act, 1894 (hereinafter, “1894 Act”) for the planned development of Delhi. The beneficiaries of such acquisition process were various state entities such as DDA, Delhi State Industrial and Infrastructure Development Corporation Ltd. (DSIIDC), and DMRC, who needed the lands for different projects like residential schemes, industrial areas, flyovers, the Delhi Metro, etc. Accordingly, over a long span of 1957-2006, various notifications under Sections 4 and 6 of the 1894 Act were issued for acquiring these lands and awards were passed under Section 11 of the 1894 Act affixing compensation. In several cases, money was deposited into the Treasury when landowners refused to appear to receive their compensation. Similarly, in some cases, possession was forbidden. Landowners were given a stay of proceedings after successfully contesting the acquisition procedure.
In the meantime, the 2013 Act was passed by Parliament, repealing the 1894 Act. Numerous changes were made to the land purchase process under this new law. Crucially, Section 24 of the 2013 Act specified that for land acquisition procedures initiated under the previous regime, certain circumstances would be deemed to have passed, such as where compensation had not been paid or possession had not been taken.
Relying on the judgements in the cases– Pune Municipal Corporation v. Harak Chand Mistrimal Solanki and Sree Balaji Nagar Residential Association v. State of Tamil Nadu, the present respondent landowners approached the High Court from 2014 to 2017 seeking declaration(s) that the acquisition proceedings initiated by GNCTD had lapsed because of non-payment of compensation or non-taking of possession.
The government authorities filed appeals, review petitions, and miscellaneous applications against these orders, seeking condonation of delay on various grounds, including suppression of facts by landowners, subsequent changes in the interpretation of Section 24(2) by the Supreme Court, and the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
KEY ISSUE
Whether a subsequent change in law can be a valid ground for condoning delays in filing appeals or applications.
LEGAL PRINCIPLES INVOLVED
Section 24 under the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013, which replaced 1894 Act, simply provides for retrospective operation of the 2013 Act qua pending acquisition proceedings under the 1894 Act. Section 24(1) says that in case of a pending land acquisition proceeding, where a compensation award has not been passed under the 1894 Act, the landowners would be entitled to compensation prescribed under the 2013 Act.
Conversely, Section 24(2) states that the land acquisition procedures under the 1894 Act would be deemed to have lapsed if the compensation award has been given under the Land Acquisition Act,1894.
CONDONATION OF DELAY
The 1963 Act, prescribes specific points of time from which the period of limitation begins to run for the institution of actions. The 1963 Act aims to prescribe the time periods within which existing rights can be enforced in courts of law. The Act does acknowledge a few xceptions when due to certain circumstances, a litigant may be prevented from initiating a lawsuit within the allotted time frame. Section 5 of the Act states that if the applicant or appellant can convince the court that they had “sufficient cause” for not instituting the appeal or application within the allotted time, then any appeal or application may be admitted after that time.
DOCTRINE OF FINALITY OF JUDGMENT AND RES JUDICATA
Section 11 of the Code of Civil Procedure envisages the doctrine of res judicata or the rule of inclusiveness of a judgment, as to the points decided either of facts, or of law, or of fact and law in every subsequent suit between the same parties. The doctrine of res judicata is based on three Roman maxims:
(a) Nemo debet bis vaxari pro una et eadem causa (no man should be vexed twice for the same cause)
(b) interest reipublicae ut sit finis litium (it is in the interest of the State that there should be an end to a litigation)
(c) re judicata pro veritate occipitur (a judicial decision must be accepted as correct).
The doctrine of finality of judgments puts an end to the judicial process, prohibiting subsequent appeals, new proceedings and disputing clearly established facts.
COURT’S RULING-
The court noted that no proceedings would ever be concluded if further changes in the law were accepted as a valid justification for a delay. It was held that a party cannot be allowed to take advantage of its deliberate inaction during the limitation period. Allowing to the contrary would distort incentives for parties and create dystopian consequences for our judicial process.
Reasoning behind why subsequent overruling of a judgement cannot be a sufficient cause is because when a case is overruled, it is only its binding nature as a precedent that is taken away and the lis between the parties is still deemed to have been settled by the overruled case. It is a settled principle of law that even an erroneous decision operates as res judicata between the parties. The court also pointed out the fact that such litigation on such grounds would lead to the multiplicity of judicial opinions on Section 24(2) of the 2013 Act.
The Court while delivering its judgement took account of the following cases:
In Pune Municipal Corporation v. Harak Chand Misirimal Solanki (2014), the Supreme Court held that depositing compensation with the Reference Court fulfilled the requirement of compensation being “paid,” but depositing it with the Government Treasury did not. In Sree Balaji Nagar Residential Association v. State of Tamil Nadu (2015), the Court ruled that a stay order did not exclude the period from the lapse calculation, and thus, failure to take possession resulted in the proceedings lapsing. The final ruling in Indore Development Authority v. Manoharlal established that both the conditions should be fulfilled- compensations must be unpaid and possession must not be taken for proceedings to lapse.
In conclusion, the Court opined that unless a case is ongoing before the appropriate court and awaiting its ultimate decision, no later change of law will be considered. Put another way, a case that has previously been decided cannot be reopened and decided again based just on a different interpretation of the law.
ANALYSIS
The Apex Court in this case used the rule of Prospective overruling, which has been borrowed from the American legal system. It specifies that a decision made in a specific case will solely apply to that case going forward and will not have any bearing on decisions made in the past. The notion of prospective overruling was not present prior to I. C. Golak Nath v. State of Punjab. It dictates that a decision made in a particular case would have operation only in the future and will not carry any retrospective effect on any past decisions.
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