By Our Reporter
SHILLONG: In a set back to the Government, the Shillong Bench of the Gauhati High Court has stayed the order of Ri-Bhoi Deputy Commissioner Akash Deep Singh to recover Rs 8 crore from Congress legislator Stanley Wiss Rymbai and to stop the land acquisition process.
Acting on the second writ petition filed by the headman of Umsawkhwan Village Durbar Handerland Nongkseh and the legislator Rymbai, the Court on Tuesday directed the Meghalaya government not to give effect to the two letters dated October 8 and 15 issued by the Ri-Bhoi Deputy Commissioner related to the cancellation of controversial land acquisition of Mawpalai protected forest and refunding of Rs 8 crore paid to the legislator as land compensation.
Earlier through the first writ petition, the villagers had sought the intervention of the court to direct the Government to release the remaining Rs 2 crore as only Rs 8 crore out of the total Rs 10 crore meant for the land compensation was paid to the legislator.
The counsels for the petitioners argued that the entire action of the Government in seeking to cancel the land acquisition proceeding was unknown to law and on the face of the admitted fact that the Umsawkhwan village was the original owner of the land, it does not matter whether the land was utilized by the soil conservation department or forest department of Meghalaya Government “in as much as no Government department could take away and utilize the land without paying acquisition compensation to the land owner/ villagers”.
However, the Advocate General KS Kynjing told the court that the land acquisition proceeding was conceived in fraud and mischief. “Hence to protect public money being misappropriated, the land acquisition proceeding should be quashed”, he said. Stating that the government’s action lacked legal foundation, the court admitted the second writ petition and granted the interim protection in favour of the petitioners against annulment of acquisition of land and recovery of compensation amount. Some reports have said that though at one point of time the land was sought to be utilized by the then Soil conservation department, the land was never formally acquired from the villagers. According to some records, on December 5, 1994 by way of a bipartite settlement between the Government officials and villagers arranged by the mediation of Dr H. Lamin, the then minister of soil conservation, the department officials formally handed over the possession of the land to the villagers of Umsawkhwan. The acquisition proceeding was initiated by the forest department in 2009 with detailed process of joint survey and demarcation of boundary by the revenue department, forest department and the village durbar and subsequently by issuing series of statutory notifications under the Land Acquisition Act 1894 and also in the Gazette of Meghalaya. The land was acquired by the order of the then Principal Secretary, Revenue department after assessment of compensation by the Collector, sources added. Sources suspected internal political rivalry behind the recent volte face of the Government on the issue.However, the counsels for the petitioners, VGK Kynta and SS Dey were unavailable for comments.