For coal acquisitions, authorities notified under the 1957 Act determine compensation and rehabilitation benefits.

The petitioner sought, among other reliefs, compensation under the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013, interest on compensation, and declarations that the Collector alone could determine compensation, rehabilitation and resettlement benefits, and employment eligibility.

SECL submitted that an identical petition had been dismissed by a Coordinate Bench in W.P.(C) No. 1283 of 2021; the petitioner did not dispute that submission. The Court therefore considered the present petition in light of that earlier decision.

Whether the petitioner’s claims could be resolved in accordance with the Coordinate Bench’s decision in W.P.(C) No. 1283 of 2021, given that the issues were identical.

Whether the Collector, rather than the authority notified under the Coal Bearing Areas (Acquisition and Development) Act, 1957, was the sole authority to determine compensation and related benefits in the acquisition.

The Court adopted the Coordinate Bench’s application of the Coal Bearing Areas (Acquisition and Development) Act, 1957. A notification dated 12 May 1999, issued under Section 3 of that Act, identified the authorities competent to determine compensation; for SECL, the relevant authorities included its specified officers.

The Ministry of Coal’s letter dated 10 July 2019 clarified that the competent authority for determining land compensation and rehabilitation and resettlement benefits is the authority already notified under Section 3 of the 1957 Act. Accordingly, the Collector was not the sole competent authority merely by virtue of the 2013 Act.

The Court accepted that the present petition raised issues identical to those decided in W.P.(C) No. 1283 of 2021, a submission the petitioner did not contest.

It adopted the earlier Bench’s reasoning that the 1999 notification and the Ministry of Coal’s 2019 clarification governed the authority competent to determine compensation and related benefits under the 1957 Act. On that basis, the petitioner’s contention that only the Collector could make those determinations was rejected in the earlier decision, and the present petition was disposed of on the same terms.

In that decision, the Court found no merit in the relevant writ petitions and dismissed them without an order as to costs.