Govt decision not to revise value of lands challenged

​Hyderabad: A public interest litigation (PIL) petition challenging the validity of the decision of the Telangana State government in not revising and updating the market values of lands in the two State was admitted by the High Court at Hyderabad on Tuesday.

The division bench comprising acting Chief Justice Ramesh Ranganathan and Justice Shameem Akhter, while admitting the PIL moved by former Congress MLA and kisan leader M Kodanda Reddy, granted the State government three weeks time to file a counter affidavit. The petitioner challenged the Memo issued by the State government on March 2 this year pronouncing that since real estate market suffered due to demonetisation the government had decided there would be no revision/updating of market values of lands in Telangana State.

The counsel for the petitioner argued that this Memo had fallen foul of statutory rules under ‘The Telangana Revision of Market Value Guidelines Rules’ 1998 as also Section 26(3) of the new Land Acquisition Act 2013 that mandates the District Collector to revise and update the market value of lands before initiating the proceedings for land acquisition under the Act.

He said the government may have power to declare that the market value of the land is zero, but even for that it has to follow the procedure prescribed under the statute. Telangana Advocate General K Ramakrishna Reddy countered saying that as per Section 47(A) of the Indian Stamps Act, the government has the power to take the decision not to revise the values.

He argued that the rules being cited by the petitioner were not actually rules but guidelines and they were not mandatory but only directory. The bench felt that this matter required further examination and admitted the petition while directing the government to file a counter within three weeks to when it was adjourned.