Justice Mishra refuses to recuse from hearing Land Acquisition matters

October 23: Justice Arun Mishra of the Supreme Court (SC) refused to recuse from hearing a batch of petitions related to the interpretation of Section 24 of the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013 (Land Acquisition Act, 2013). A Constitution bench headed by Justice Arun Mishra along with Justices Indira Banerjee, Vineet Saran, MR Shah, and Ravindra Bhat passed the order in this regard. Certain parties in this legislation, including a farmer’s association, sought Justice Mishra’s recusal on the grounds of “bias of predisposition”. 

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The allegation of bias 

The contentious part of the Land Acquisition Act 2013 was Section 24(2) which stipulated that the acquisition proceedings initiated 5 years before the Act would lapse if compensation had not been paid to the landowner. A three-judge bench of the SC in 2014 held that the deposit of compensation amount by the government in the treasury cannot be treated as payment to the landowner. Subsequently, in 2017, a bench comprising of Justices Mishra and Roy cast doubt on the earlier decision and referred it to a larger bench. Thereafter, a three-judge bench involving Justice Mishra overruled the decision in 2018. However, the issue was referred to the CJI because of disagreement within different benches. This has resulted in a peculiar situation where Justice Mishra is himself part of the Constitution bench that will determine the correctness of the 2018 judgement.  

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'Blackest chapter in history'

Senior counsel Shyam Divan admitted that there was an apprehension about the presence of Justice Mishra on the bench since the consideration of the issue by the bench was in “corrective jurisdiction”. During the hearing, Justice Mishra had hinted that he would not recuse from the case. Furthermore, he raised questions on the “persons behind” the plea for recusal. 

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He said, "Circumstances compelled me to hear this. This would be the blackest chapter in history if we succumb to this. There are forces and I am not referring to media. Who are these persons? Who is behind this (recusal application)? These are not the poor farmers. They are not farmers and I am saying it with a sense of responsibility”. 

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