GREATER NOIDA INDUSL.DEVT.AUTH vs DEVENDRA KUMAR & ORS Country/Territory India Type of court National - higher court Date Jul 6, 2011 Source UNEP, InforMEA Court name Supreme Court of India Judge Ganguly, A.K.Singhvi, G.S. Language English Subject Land & soil, Legal questions Keyword Constitutional law Land tenure Foreign land tenure Abstract The Supreme Court upheld an Allahabad High Court order quashing the Uttar Pradesh notification to acquire 156 hectares of land for construction of residential apartments by private builders in the Greater Noida Extension area of Gautam Budh Nagar district. It ordered the return of the land to villagers. After the Mayawati government transferred the land, the builders started the construction of apartments and thousands of people, commercial institutions and banks invested in the property. In its order, the Bench said the reasons recorded by a Division Bench of the High Court for holding that the State Government ought not to have invoked the urgency clause under Section 17 of the Land Acquisition Act and dispensed with an application under Section 5, as also its conclusion that the entire exercise of acquisition was a colourable exercise, did not suffer from any infirmity requiring interference by this court. “The SLPs filed by the GNIDA and real estate developers and builders, including Supertech and Amrapali, are dismissed". The Bench said it imposed costs on the GNIDA “for undertaking an exercise of allotment of land to the builders, in complete violation of the purpose for which the land was sought to be acquired, even before the approval by the government for change of land use. The amount should be paid in three months. Detailed reasons to follow. Full text COU-159307.pdf