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IN THE SUPREME COURT OF INDIA CIVIL APPELLATE JURISDICTION
CIVIL APPEAL No.14731 OF 2024
(Arising out of SLP(C)No.9524 of 2020)
THE TAHSILDAR & ANR. … APPELLANTS
Versus RENJITH GEORGE … RESPONDENT
WITH
CIVIL APPEAL No.14732 OF 2024 (Arising out of SLP(C)No.12312 of 2020)
CIVIL APPEAL No.14733 OF 2024 (Arising out of SLP(C)No.13489 of 2020)
O R D E R
1. Leave granted.
2. Heard learned Senior Counsel for the parties and carefully
perused the material placed on record.
3. The controversy herein has emanated from the applications
moved by the respondent-landowners for the conversion of their
‘paddy land’ into ‘non-agricultural purpose land’. It appears that
most of the respondents had moved the above-mentioned applications
before the Revenue Divisional Officer under Clause 6 of the Kerala
Land Utilisation Order, 1967. Some of these applications were
allowed granting the conversions, while some remained pending.
Meanwhile, the Kerala Conservation of Paddy Land and Wetland
(Amendment) Bill, 2018 was passed to amend the Kerala Conservation
of Paddy Land and Wetland Act, 2008 (for short, `2008 Act’). The
amended Act came into force w.e.f 30.12.2017, as is evident from
Section 1(2) of the Amendment Act, which reads as follows:
“1(2) It shall be deemed to have come into force on the
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30th day of December, 2017.”
4. The dispute eventually arose when the statutory
aut...