Introduction:
The Telangana High Court has held that the statutory three-month limitation period prescribed under Section 28-A of the Land Acquisition Act, 1894 cannot be used by the State to defeat the legitimate compensation claims of landowners whose timely applications seeking a reference under Section 18 of the Act were wrongly rejected by the authorities. The Division Bench of Justice P. Sam Koshy and Justice Vakiti Ramakrishna Reddy made the observation while dismissing a writ appeal filed by the State of Telangana against an order directing re-determination of compensation payable to a group of landowners.
The judgment in State of Telangana & Ors. v. Bandari Rajaiah & Ors., Writ Appeal No. 6 of 2025, arose from the acquisition of residential properties belonging to 55 persons for submergence under the P.P. Rao Project. The dispute ultimately centred on the interaction between Sections 18 and 28-A of the Land Acquisition Act, 1894, and, more importantly, on whether the State could rely upon the limitation prescribed under Section 28-A after its own officers had prevented the landowners from pursuing the statutory remedy available under Section 18.
Section 18 of the Land Acquisition Act provides a mechanism by which a person who has not accepted an award made by the Collector may require the matter to be referred to the civil court for determination of specified questions relating to the acquisition, including the amount of compensation. The provision therefore provides an important statutory remedy to a landowner who considers the compensation awarded by the Collector inadequate.
Section 28-A, on the other hand, creates a separate remedy for certain landowners whose lands were acquired under the same notification but who did not seek a reference under Section 18. Where a court awards compensation in excess of the amount awarded by the Collector to a person whose case was referred under Section 18, other persons covered by the same acquisition notification may seek re-determination of the compensation payable to them on the basis of that enhanced award. Section 28-A(1) prescribes a period of three months for making such an application.
The controversy before the Telangana High Court arose because the 55 landowners had, in fact, approached the Land Acquisition Officer within six weeks of the compensation award in 2003. They expressly sought reference of their claims to the civil court under Section 18 so that the compensation payable to them could be determined afresh.
Instead of referring the matters to the civil court, however, the Land Acquisition Officer rejected their applications on the ground that the landowners had already accepted the compensation amount without expressly recording a protest. The authorities therefore treated the payment as having been accepted and concluded that the landowners were not entitled to seek a reference under Section 18.
The subsequent developments created the unusual situation which ultimately came before the High Court. Ten other awardees covered by the same acquisition award succeeded in obtaining enhanced compensation through a court reference. Once that decision became final, the 55 landowners approached the authorities seeking re-determination of their compensation on the basis of the enhanced amount awarded to those similarly situated claimants.
Their applications were rejected on the ground that they had been filed beyond the three-month period prescribed under Section 28-A of the Land Acquisition Act.
The landowners challenged that decision before the High Court. A Single Judge found merit in their contention and directed the State to re-determine their compensation. The State thereafter preferred the writ appeal, arguing that the Single Judge had effectively allowed claims which were barred by limitation under Section 28-A.
The Division Bench, however, rejected that approach. It found that the 55 landowners could not be treated as ordinary Section 28-A applicants because their original entitlement had arisen under Section 18 itself. Their applications seeking reference had been submitted within six weeks of the award and were rejected by the authorities. The later invocation of Section 28-A could not alter the true character of their underlying claim.
The Court emphasised that the State could not first prevent landowners from exercising a statutory remedy and then rely upon the expiry of a limitation period relating to another remedy to defeat their claims. In particularly emphatic terms, the Bench observed that “No party, and least of all the State, can be permitted to take advantage of its own wrong.”
The judgment is significant because it does not dilute or extend the ordinary limitation period contained in Section 28-A. Instead, it draws a distinction between an ordinary claim made under Section 28-A and a case where a landowner had already timely invoked Section 18 but was prevented from pursuing that remedy because of an erroneous decision by the acquiring authority.
Arguments of the Parties:
Appearing for the State, Special Government Pleader P. Sridhar Reddy challenged the order of the Single Judge directing re-determination of compensation. The principal submission on behalf of the State was that the applications made by the 55 landowners under Section 28-A were clearly beyond the statutory period of three months and were therefore liable to be rejected.
The State contended that Section 28-A contains a specific and mandatory limitation period. According to the State, once the enhanced compensation awarded to the other claimants became final, any person seeking re-determination under Section 28-A was required to approach the competent authority within three months from the relevant date contemplated by the statute. The respondents had admittedly approached the authorities after that period had expired.
The State also relied upon the fact that the rejection of the landowners’ original Section 18 applications in 2003 had not been specifically challenged at the appropriate time. According to the State, the rejection therefore continued to operate and could not be indirectly questioned decades later through a writ proceeding seeking enhanced compensation.
The State’s argument was essentially that the respondents could not bypass the statutory requirements of Section 28-A by relying upon their earlier unsuccessful Section 18 applications. Once those applications had been rejected and the landowners had not separately challenged the rejection, the State argued, they could not reopen the issue by filing a later claim for re-determination.
The State further maintained that limitation provisions contained in statutes are required to be given effect according to their terms. In its submission, permitting the respondents to obtain relief after the expiry of the statutory period would effectively amount to rewriting Section 28-A and creating an exception that Parliament had not expressly provided.
The landowners, represented by advocate G. Chandan Raaj, opposed the State’s appeal and supported the Single Judge’s order. Their primary submission was that their claims did not originate with the later Section 28-A applications. Their rights had been asserted much earlier, when they submitted written applications seeking reference under Section 18 within six weeks of the 2003 award.
According to the landowners, the authorities had themselves prevented the exercise of the Section 18 remedy. Their applications were not rejected because they were filed late. They were rejected on the ground that the applicants had accepted the compensation without recording an express protest.
The respondents argued that the requirement of protest could not be applied in such a rigid manner as to defeat an otherwise valid request for a court reference. Their written applications seeking reference, made shortly after the award, demonstrated that they were dissatisfied with the compensation and wanted the question of quantum to be adjudicated by the civil court.
The landowners further argued that the subsequent Section 28-A applications were merely an attempt to obtain the same compensation benefit that had already been granted to similarly situated landowners under the same acquisition. They could not be deprived of enhanced compensation merely because the authorities had earlier refused to refer their claims under Section 18.
The respondents also pointed out that ten other awardees covered by the same acquisition had obtained enhanced compensation through a court reference. The enhanced award had subsequently attained finality. The landowners therefore contended that denying them the same rate of compensation, despite their timely request for a reference in 2003, would result in an arbitrary distinction between persons affected by the very same acquisition proceedings.
Another important submission was that the State could not benefit from an illegality committed by its own officers. If the Section 18 applications had been lawfully referred in 2003, the landowners would have had the opportunity to have their compensation determined by the civil court along with the other claimants. According to the respondents, the State could not rely upon the consequences of its own wrongful refusal as a reason for subsequently denying them relief.
The respondents also disputed the State’s objection concerning the form of the writ petition. Although the petition did not separately seek an order expressly quashing the 2003 rejection, the landowners submitted that the illegality of that rejection had been specifically pleaded and was a matter contested before the Court. The entire basis of their claim was that their Section 18 applications had been wrongly rejected.
The respondents therefore maintained that the Court should look at the substance of the proceedings rather than allow the State to defeat a genuine compensation claim through a technical objection regarding the form of the prayer.
Court’s Judgment:
The Division Bench rejected the State’s challenge and upheld the direction for re-determination of compensation. The Court’s reasoning proceeded from the nature of the original claims made by the 55 landowners and the consequences of the authorities’ refusal to refer those claims under Section 18.
The Court first recognised the statutory distinction between Sections 18 and 28-A. Section 18 provides a remedy to a landowner dissatisfied with the Collector’s award and permits the matter to be referred to the civil court. Section 28-A serves a different purpose. It extends the benefit of a court-awarded enhancement to other landowners covered by the same acquisition notification who had not themselves sought a Section 18 reference.
The existence of the three-month limitation period under Section 28-A was therefore not disputed. The important question was whether the respondents should be treated as persons who had never invoked Section 18 and were consequently dependent exclusively upon the Section 28-A remedy.
The Bench answered that question in the negative.
The Court noted that the 55 landowners had made written requests for reference within six weeks of the 2003 award. Their applications were therefore made well within the relevant statutory period for seeking a reference under Section 18. Their initial conduct demonstrated that they were dissatisfied with the compensation awarded by the Land Acquisition Officer and wanted the matter adjudicated by the civil court.
The authorities nevertheless rejected those applications on the ground that the landowners had accepted the compensation without expressly recording a protest.
The Division Bench found this reasoning unsustainable in the circumstances. It observed that the timely written request for a reference itself demonstrated that the landowners had not accepted the award in the sense necessary to deprive them of the statutory remedy. The Court further held that the law did not require a landowner’s protest to be recorded in one particular prescribed form.
This aspect of the judgment is important because the Court focused on the substance of the landowners’ conduct. A person who approaches the authority shortly after an award and expressly seeks a reference for determination of enhanced compensation is manifestly questioning the adequacy of the award. The Court therefore found it difficult to accept that such a person could simultaneously be treated as having unequivocally accepted the compensation.
The Bench also found significance in the manner in which the authorities had treated the claims of the different awardees. The record showed that ten other awardees had ultimately secured enhanced compensation through court references. The Court considered it arbitrary to treat the 55 landowners differently when they too had submitted written requests for reference.
The Court’s reasoning was not that every landowner covered by the acquisition automatically becomes entitled to the enhanced compensation. Rather, the critical circumstance was that these particular landowners had already taken timely steps under Section 18 and were prevented from pursuing those steps by the decision of the authorities.
The Court therefore characterised their entitlement as one arising under Section 18 in 2003. The later reliance upon Section 28-A could not change the legal character of the original claim.
The Bench made a strong observation concerning the State’s attempt to rely upon the limitation period. It held that, having wrongly refused to refer the claims under Section 18, the State could not subsequently contend that the landowners ought to have followed the Section 28-A route and that their applications under that provision were now time-barred.
The Court observed:
“Having illegally refused to refer the claims of the writ petitioners under Section 18 of the Act, the State now says that the writ petitioners ought to have travelled the route of Section 28-A, and are out of time under that provision. No party, and least of all the State, can be permitted to take advantage of its own wrong.”
The principle expressed by the Bench is rooted in a broader rule of law that a party cannot ordinarily rely upon its own wrongful conduct to defeat another person’s legal entitlement. The maxim nullus commodum capere potest de injuria sua propria embodies the principle that no person should obtain an advantage from his own wrong.
The Court applied that principle specifically to the conduct of the acquiring authority. The limitation period in Section 28-A was never intended, according to the Bench, to protect an authority which had itself unlawfully prevented a claimant from accessing the remedy under Section 18.
The Court was careful, however, not to convert this principle into a general relaxation of Section 28-A. It expressly clarified that the judgment did not dilute the mandatory three-month limitation period applicable to ordinary applications under that provision.
This distinction protects the statutory scheme while addressing the exceptional circumstances of the present case. A landowner who never sought a Section 18 reference and later attempts to invoke Section 28-A must ordinarily comply with the limitation prescribed by Parliament. The present respondents stood on a different footing because they had already approached the authority in time and had been wrongfully denied the Section 18 remedy.
The Court also rejected the State’s objection based on the fact that the 2003 rejection had not been separately challenged through a specific prayer for quashing that order.
The Bench examined the pleadings and found that the illegality surrounding the 2003 rejection had been pleaded and contested. The absence of a separate formal prayer to quash the earlier rejection was therefore not considered sufficient to deny substantive relief, particularly when the entire claim for re-determination rested upon the wrongful rejection of the Section 18 applications.
In this context, the Court adopted a substantive approach rather than allowing the dispute to be decided purely on the technical form of the pleadings. The landowners had consistently asserted that they had sought a reference within time and that the authorities had unlawfully prevented them from pursuing it.
The Court also took into consideration the subsequent conduct of the landowners. After learning that other awardees had obtained enhanced compensation through court proceedings, the respondents approached the authorities for corresponding relief. Their actions therefore demonstrated continued efforts to secure appropriate compensation rather than abandonment of their claims.
The judgment also reflects the constitutional requirement that State action must not operate arbitrarily. Where persons similarly situated are subjected to different treatment without a rational basis, the action may attract scrutiny under Article 14 of the Constitution. In the present case, the Bench found it significant that written applications seeking the same statutory remedy were treated differently, despite the applicants being covered by the same acquisition proceedings.
The Court therefore upheld the direction issued by the Single Judge requiring the State to re-determine the compensation payable to the 55 landowners at the rates awarded to the ten other successful claimants.
The relief was not confined to the basic enhanced compensation. The Bench directed that the landowners should receive the applicable additional amount, solatium and interest, after adjusting or deducting the amounts that had already been paid to them.
The State was directed to complete the payment within three months.
Thus, the judgment does not create a blanket exemption from limitation under Section 28-A. Instead, it addresses a narrower but significant situation in which a landowner had already exercised the statutory right under Section 18 within time and was prevented from pursuing it because of an erroneous decision by the acquiring authority.
The decision reinforces the principle that procedural provisions must operate within the framework of fairness and legality. Limitation is ordinarily intended to bring certainty to legal proceedings, but it cannot be transformed into a shield for an authority that itself caused the claimant’s inability to pursue the appropriate statutory remedy.
For the 55 landowners in the present case, their legal journey began not with the delayed Section 28-A applications but with their timely Section 18 requests in 2003. The High Court treated those original applications as the foundation of their entitlement. The subsequent reference to Section 28-A was therefore not permitted to erase the fact that they had already invoked the principal remedy available to them.
By dismissing the State’s appeal, the Division Bench affirmed the Single Judge’s direction and ensured that the landowners would receive compensation at the enhanced rates granted to similarly situated claimants under the same acquisition proceedings.
The judgment consequently strikes a balance between respecting statutory limitation and preventing an inequitable outcome caused by administrative error. It makes clear that while courts cannot ordinarily extend a statutory period merely on equitable grounds, the State cannot invoke limitation to take advantage of its own unlawful refusal to provide a statutory remedy.
The Telangana High Court’s decision therefore carries significance beyond the immediate compensation dispute. It reiterates that land acquisition proceedings must be administered consistently, that statutory remedies cannot be frustrated by technical objections unsupported by the substance of the claimant’s conduct, and that the State, as a public authority, cannot profit from its own wrongful action.
At the sae time, the Court’s express clarification regarding Section 2