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-- Art. 156 (2)-Economic council-Functions, held, of _ advisory nature.

-- Art. 9--Punjab Acquisition of Land (Housing) Act (VIII of 1973), S. 6-Lahore Development Authority Act (XXX of 1975), S. 13-Contention that scheme for which land acquired not sanc tioned by competent authority-''Authority"-Mere wrong des cription of designation or power makes no difference if same person has authority in law to do a particular act.

Shahid Hamid for -Petitioners.

Farooq Zaman and Rads Ahmad for Respondent,

Date of hearing : 21st March,. 1982.

The petitioners who are owners of land included in Gujjarpure Scheme, Lahore, have challenged the acquisition proceedings taken under the Punjab Acquisition of Land (Housing) Act, 1973, on the ground that the scheme, for which this land is. being acquired, has not been validly sanctioned by a competent authority.

2. Briefly, the facts of the case are that respondent No. 1 issued a public notice under section 6 of the Punjab Acquisition- of Land. (Housing) Act (hereinafter called the Housing Act) intimating that the respondent No. 3 intends to take over possession .of the notified area. The petitioners asked the respondent No. I to withdraw the notice but in vain. They, therefore. filed the present petition challenging the public notices dated 'a 9th February, 1982 and 25th May, 1980 on the ground that the same are void and without lawful authority.

3. 1t is contended that as Gujjarpura Scheme has not been approved by the National Economic Council, it is not an approved scheme under section 13 of the Lahore Development Act, 1975, (hereinafter called the L. D. A. Act). The learned counsel also relied on Articles 137, 147, 1.49 and 156 of the 1973 Constitution, as adopted by the Provisional Constitution Order, 1981. The contention, however, has -no force as the function of the National Economic Council under Article 156 (2) of the 1973 Constitution are just advisory in nature and, therefore, any violation of the instructions contained in Annexure E' cannot be fatal to the action taken. .

4. The learned counsel then submitted that as the power to approve a scheme had been conferred under section 13 of the L. D.. A. Act on the Government, the approval as contained in the document (Annexure D') by the Chairman, L. D. A., is not valid. Even this contention has no force, firstly, for the reason that the sanction has in fact been granted by the Governor/M. L. A., and secondly, it is well established that mere wrong description of a designation or power could not make any difference, ins case the same person did have the authority in law to do a particular act.

5. The learned counsel then submitted that as the information required to be given under rule 6 of the Puniab Acquisition of Land (Housing) Rules, 1973 had not been supplied, the, summary, on which the Governor passed his approving order, the Scheme is not valid. It is to be noted that the summary did supply a let of information. The precise objection taken is that the "proposed land use pattern" which means percentages of the area of plots reserved for various purposes, is missing. The absence of the size of the plots in the summary as well as the details of the utility services were also referred to. It was further stated that the unit-cost of a developed plot and its tentative price has also not been given. The time schedule has also. been omitted and the P. C. I. was not prepared.

6: The learned counsel for the respondent submitted that all. the information necessary for the approval had been supplied to the Governor. In the alternative, he stated that as only sections 4 to 20 of the Housing Act had been applied to the L. D. A. under section 26 of the L. D. A. Act, the rules framed under section 21 do not apply. This contention has no force. Section 26 of the L. D. A. Act incorporates in the L. D. A. Act, only sections 4 to 20 of .the Housing Act. by expressly saying they "shall, with all necessary adaptations, mutatis mutandis apply as if they have been enacted and form part of this Act". So, apart from the doctrine of incorporation, which also embodies the same concept, the legislature here expressly states that only sections 4 to 20 of the Housing Act shall be deemed to have been enacted as 'a part of the L. D. A. Act. They shall be deemed to have been physically lifted from the Housing Act and incor porated in the L: .D. A. Act. No other section of Housing Act including section 21 could, therefore, be incorporated in the L. D. A. Act: Section 21 concerns rule-making and the above view is strengthened by the fact that L. D. A. Act has its own section 44 empowering the Government to make rules to carry out the purposes of the Act. The rules have in fact been framed, thereunder already.

7. 1n any case, a perusal of the summary prepared for the approval of the Governor (Annexure D') shows that the respondents had given all the substantial facts therein and in case the Governor felt any difficulty in applying his mind, he would have refused to approve the scheme, before all the information was supplied to him. It may further be seen that rule 6 is meant to facilitate the sanctioning process by the Governor and, there fore, being an intra departmental requirement, the outsiders would not be concerned unless it affected their rights directly or indirectly. The peti tioners are concerned here only with the valid acquisition of their land for an approved scheme and if the same had been done, it could not be challenged by outsiders simply for the reason that some information was lacking and also in view of section 13 (4) of the L. D. A. Act. It reads as under :- -

"The publication of a sanction under subsection (3), shall be conclusive evidence that the scheme has been duly framed and sanctioned."

8. The learned counsel then submitted that as the scheme violates the master-plan the same is unlawful. He also produced the master-plan in support of his plea. It was however, admitted by him that the master plane could be revised' or changed. The plea taken on behalf of the respondent is that they have revised the plan. In this view of the matter, I do not find any justification to set at naught the scheme.

9. The last question by the learned counsel for the petitioner was that the notices issued by the respondents under section 6 of the Housing Act do not strictly correspond with its wording and .had not been served as stipulated therein; He, however, conceded that all the petitioners knew about the notices and the respondents never refused to hear any- one of them for the simple reason that they appeared on a later date. The peti tioners in fact served a legal notice dated 13th February, 1982 on the Land Acquisition Officer against the above public notice. It may be noted that the precise objection is that the respondent should have given a date and time for the petitioner/land owners to appear, whereas they have mentioned no such time and date. The explanation given by the respondents is that as a very large number of land-owners were effected, they gave a starting date for their objections etc. without any restriction and, therefore, the action was taken for their benefit.

In view of the above, there is no merit in this petition and the same is dismissed with no order as to costs.

Petition dismissed.

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