By IANS,
Kolkata : The Calcutta High Court Wednesday declared as valid and constitutional the Singur land act passed by the West Bengal government led by Mamata Banerjee.
Delivering the judgement in a packed court room, Justice Indra Prasanna Mukherjee rejected the plea of Tata Motors challenging the legislation and ruled it was enacted in a valid manner.
All the actions taken by the government under the Singur Land Rehabilitation and Development Act were also valid, the verdict said.
Justice Mukherjee, however, said the company was entitled to compensation which shall be ascertained by the District Judge, Hooghly.
The judge stayed the order unconditionally till Nov 2 for the Durga Puja vacation and to give sufficient time to the parties to seek further legal redress.
The District Magistrate and Superintendent of Police, Hooghly, have been appointed special officers to supervise peaceful removal of belongings from the original Tata Nano plant premises within two months from Nov 2.
To a query from the company’s counsel Samaraditya Pal on whether re-distribution of land could start immediately as the petition had been disposed off, the judge clarified that there would be a stay on all actions under the act till Nov 2.
The automobile major had shifted the Nano plant to Sanand in Gujarat from Singur in October 2008, succumbing to protests by farmers led by the Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress that sought the return of 400 acres taken from farmers reportedly unwilling to part with their land.
The Singur movement reversed the Trinamool’s sliding electoral fortunes and it went from strength to strength over the next three years to unseat the Left Front from power.
Within a month of forming the government, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee enacted the Singur Land Rehabilitation and Development Act, which was passed by the state assembly June 14.
This scrapped the land lease given to Tata Motors by the Left Front regime for the small car plant.
The new act came into force June 21. The very next day, the automaker moved the high court challenging the legislation.
The court declined the company’s plea to restrain the government from re-distributing to farmers their land acquired for the Nano car plant.
The company approached the Supreme Court against the “undue haste” being shown by the government in returning the land after it was denied any interim relief by the high court.
The Supreme Court June 29 stayed the re-distribution of land acquired from farmers for the auto giant’s project till the final order on the matter by the high court.