Rail link to Shree Cement cargo terminal is a public purpose, Chhattisgarh High Court rules; farmers lose

Justice Amitendra Kishore Prasad held that a terminal operator drawing incidental benefit from a Special Railway Project does not turn the acquisition private, that Section 20-D gives landowners a hearing and not a veto, and that alignment is for the engineers, not the court.

The Chhattisgarh High Court has dismissed four writ petitions by farmers of Baloda Bazar-Bhatapara district who tried to stop the acquisition of their fields for a railway line from Hathbandh station to a Gati Shakti Multi-Modal Cargo Terminal that Shree Cement is to operate. Justice Amitendra Kishore Prasad, sitting as a single judge, held on 27 October 2026 that a railway connectivity project does not stop being a public purpose because one industry stands to gain from it, that the Sub-Divisional Officer at Simga had done what Section 20-D of the Railways Act, 1989 required when he heard and rejected the objections, and that a court cannot pick a better alignment for a railway. The interim stay granted in February was vacated. The petitioners may still pursue compensation under the Act.

Three families in Raveli, and a line through their irrigated fields

The lead petition, WPC No. 785 of 2026, was filed by three members of one family of Village Raveli in Tehsil Suhela: Bedram Verma, 64, Prema Bai Verma, 80, and Bineshwari Verma, 62. The parcels were small. Of Bedram Verma's 0.14 hectare at Khasra No. 700, 0.06 hectare was marked for acquisition; of Prema Bai's 0.18 hectare at Khasra No. 657, 0.08 hectare; and of Bineshwari Verma's two plots totalling 1.32 hectare, 0.11 hectare.

The Ministry of Railways had published a notification dated 16 June 2025 in a newspaper on 28 June 2025 proposing to acquire land for a railway track from Hathbandh Railway Station East Cabin to Khaparadih village, the site of the cargo terminal. The family filed objections under Section 20-D on 10 July 2025. Their case was that the acquisition was not for the public but for Shree Cement, a private company; that land had already been acquired by the Central Government on 12 June 1998 for a railway line serving UltraTech Cement from Rawan to Dhoha (Hathbandh), with vacant land available alongside that track; that Shree Cement had privately bought land and built its own track from Khapridih up to Raveli, which could simply be joined to the existing line; and that the proposed alignment would cut through the middle of their irrigated fields.

When the objections went unanswered and the acquisition moved on, the petitioners came to the High Court in WPC Nos. 5079, 5083 and 5069 of 2025. On 24 September 2025 the court disposed of those petitions with a direction to the SDO, as competent authority, to decide the objections in accordance with law within 30 days. The order was placed before the SDO by a representation dated 10 October 2025. The Railways filed a reply to the objections on 16 December 2025. On 27 January 2026 the SDO rejected the objections. The petitioners called the order summary and mechanical, passed without any enquiry, spot inspection or engagement with the specific grounds raised. On 23 February 2026 the High Court stayed further proceedings under the notification until the next date.

Thirteen villages, 93 hectares and a village pond

Three connected petitions widened the picture. WPC No. 1523 of 2026 was filed by six agriculturists of Villages Dhabhindih, Budgahan, Basin and Raveli, one of whom had earlier obtained the same 24 September 2025 direction in WPC No. 5082 of 2025. Their objections had been rejected by the same order of 27 January 2026.

WPC No. 6592 of 2025, by 31 residents of Village Khillora and nearby villages in Tehsil Simga, set out the full administrative sequence. By a notification dated 26 March 2025 the Ministry of Railways declared the proposed link a Special Railway Project under Section 2(37A) of the Railways Act. On 22 April 2025 it appointed the SDO (Revenue), Simga, as competent authority. On 15 April 2025 the Collector froze sale, purchase, mutation, diversion and construction in 13 villages on the proposed alignment. The Section 20-A gazette notification of 19 June 2025 covered approximately 93.0832 hectares across those 13 villages. The Gram Panchayat of Khillora passed a resolution on 2 July 2025 and wrote on 9 and 11 July 2025 objecting to the impact on fertile land, the village pond, the school, the playground and other common properties, and to the absence of social and environmental impact assessment. A further objection on 25 July 2025 asked that compensation for two khasras in litigation in Civil Suit No. 12 of 2019 be withheld. Notices dated 25 August 2025 fixed a hearing for 8 September 2025. Then, on 19 September 2025, twenty-eight villagers filed a joint affidavit supporting the project, provided the alignment ran alongside the existing UltraTech line and whole parcels were taken so holdings were not fragmented.

WPC No. 987 of 2026 came from five farmers of Village Kesali. They traced the project back to an earlier fight. UltraTech Cement, which has plants at Rawan and Hirmi, had challenged an in-principle approval dated 8 April 2021 for a Greenfield Private Freight Terminal; the High Court allowed that petition, WPC No. 2989 of 2021, on 9 May 2024 and quashed the approval with liberty to the authorities to reconsider after hearing UltraTech, and writ appeals against that order were dismissed. The Kesali petitioners said Shree Cement then went to the Railways with a separate proposal while the appeals were pending, that Notification S.O. 2732(E) under Section 20-A followed on 16 June 2025, that their objections of 30 June 2025 were rejected on 27 January 2026 without a site inspection, and that a Section 20-E declaration was published on 19 February 2026 stating that the objections had been decided and the lands would vest in the Central Government.

Objection rights versus a statutory bar

Mr Purnendra Khinchariya, Mr Praveen Dhurandhar, Mr Aman Ansari and Mr Vikram Ussendi, appearing on behalf of Mr Ishan Verma for the petitioners, put the case on Article 300-A of the Constitution and on the character of Section 20-D. The right to object before being deprived of property, they argued, is substantive, the competent authority acts quasi-judicially when it decides objections, and even an administrative authority must give reasons where its decision takes away valuable rights. The order of 27 January 2026 recorded a conclusion in a few lines and nothing else. They relied on Nareshbhai Bhagubhai v. Union of India, (2019) 15 SCC 1, for the proposition that the statutory safeguards on objections are mandatory, and also cited HDFC Bank Ltd v. Kishore K. Mehta, 2026 SCC OnLine SC 1320, and State of West Bengal v. Committee for Protection of Democratic Rights, (2010) 3 SCC 571.

Mr Anand Dadariya, Deputy Advocate General, answered that the SDO had issued notice, given a personal hearing and considered the objections, the Railways' reply and the technical report before deciding; a rejection is not a denial of hearing. He added a point of timing. The petitioners had not challenged the declaration under Section 20-E, and Section 20-E(4) says a declaration, once made, cannot be called in question in any court. They could not, he said, undo that stage by attacking only the earlier notification and the order on objections. Ownership of the land and the line would vest in the Railways, so the private-benefit argument was misconceived, and the court would not substitute its view on the necessity or suitability of land absent illegality, mala fides or breach of mandatory procedure.

Mr Manoj Paranjpe, Senior Advocate, with Mr Pankaj Singh and Mr Pranjal Agrawal for Shree Cement, said 57 objections had been received and decided after hearing, the Section 20-E declaration of 19 February 2026 had vested the land absolutely in the Central Government under Section 20-E(2), and the project ran across ten villages and about 800 landholders, so it could not be stalled by a few. Under the Gati Shakti Multi-Modal Cargo Terminal Policy, he explained, the Railway Administration acquires the connectivity land at the terminal operator's cost but keeps ownership and control; the operator gets no proprietary right. He relied on Sooraram Pratap Reddy v. District Collector, Ranga Reddy District, (2008) 9 SCC 552, for a broad reading of public purpose, on the High Court's own decision in Surendra Mohan Bist v. State of Chhattisgarh, WPC No. 562 of 2013, decided 25 October 2024, and on Nareshbhai Bhagubhai and Ramniklal N. Bhutta v. State of Maharashtra, (1997) 1 SCC 134, for the submission that even a procedural lapse would leave the landowners to compensation under Sections 20-F and 20-G rather than quashing. By an additional note he cited Smt. Ayyamma v. Government of India, WP Nos. 203560 and 200328 of 2025, decided by the Kalaburagi Bench of the Karnataka High Court on 17 July 2026, which upheld an identical Chapter IV-A acquisition for a Gati Shakti terminal in which Shree Cement was also a respondent.

Mr Ramakant Mishra, Deputy Solicitor General, with Mr Rishabh Deo Singh for the Union of India, pointed to the Railway Board policy dated 6 December 2022 and Clause 17.2.2 of the terminal policy, under which the acquired land vests absolutely in Indian Railways and Shree Cement has no right, title or interest in it and cannot carry on any unrelated commercial activity there. On the alignment, he said the alternative along the UltraTech line would take the track through a reservoir and waterlogged area and require a long-span bridge. Mr Virendra Verma, for the Gram Panchayat, said the panchayat did not oppose the project but wanted the pond, school and playground protected, the alignment moved beside the existing corridor if possible, and lawful compensation paid.

Incidental benefit to an industry does not make the acquisition private

Justice Prasad framed the question as whether the order of 27 January 2026 called for interference under Article 226 and, if so, whether the acquisition should be quashed or the objections sent back for fresh decision. He began with the nature of the project. It was not, he said, an isolated acquisition for a private person; it was part of a Special Railway Project undertaken under a Union policy and Chapter IV-A of the Railways Act. He accepted that Shree Cement is the proposed terminal operator and that the line would carry its cement. But the test was the nature of the project and who would own and control the land and infrastructure. The Union's stated position was that the land vests absolutely in the Railways and the operator's role is confined to running the terminal under the policy. The petitioners had produced nothing to show that the land would end up with Shree Cement or that the Railways were acquiring it as a device to hand property to a company.

Applying Sooraram Pratap Reddy, the judge held that a project may carry an element of private benefit without losing its public character so long as the dominant purpose is genuinely public. The question was not whether Shree Cement would benefit but whether the acquisition was fundamentally for public infrastructure. On the record, it was. Public purpose, he said, has to be read broadly and realistically where the project forms part of the national railway network. The Karnataka decision in Ayyamma, though not binding, reasoned the same way.

Section 20-D: the right is to be heard, not to win

The petitioners' main grievance was the quality of the order on their objections. Justice Prasad went back over the record. After the court's direction of 24 September 2025, notices had issued, the petitioners had been heard, and the Railways had filed their response; the SDO had then passed the order of 27 January 2026. The defect the petitioners had originally complained of, that the acquisition was proceeding with their objections unanswered, had been cured by the very exercise the court had ordered.

Section 20-D, the judge agreed, confers a real statutory right that cannot be reduced to an empty formality, and the authority must consider objections objectively. But the right has limits. It does not require the authority to accept the landowner's view of necessity, alignment or feasibility, and it “does not confer upon the landowners a veto over a duly sanctioned railway project”. Once objections have been heard and considered, an adverse decision is not a breach of the section. The objections about public purpose, benefit to Shree Cement, the alternative alignment, the existing infrastructure and the impact on farmland were all before the SDO, who rejected them after considering the Railways' material.

On alignment, the court declined to adjudicate. Choosing where a railway runs involves technical, engineering and administrative judgment; the Railways had explained that the petitioners' preferred route crossed a reservoir and would need a long bridge; whether one route is cheaper or more convenient is for the technical authorities, and absent mala fides, arbitrariness, colourable exercise of power or breach of a mandatory provision the court would not substitute its opinion. Nor did Shree Cement's private purchase of land and its own track in the area prove that the statutory acquisition was colourable. The judge also rejected the argument that Section 20-D obliges the authority to conduct a spot inspection or a trial-type enquiry on every objection; the extent of enquiry depends on what the objections require, and here the SDO had the project material, the objections and the Railways' reply.

The judge accepted that the order of 27 January 2026 did not deal with every objection in the detail with which counsel had argued them. That did not make it unlawful. The substance of the objections was before the authority, which recorded its conclusion after considering them and the Railways' stand. Nareshbhai Bhagubhai established that statutory safeguards must be complied with; it did not mean an acquisition must be annulled after a hearing and consideration merely because the result went against the landowners. Surendra Mohan Bist was relevant for the limited scope of interference with an acquisition that forms part of a larger railway project.

Article 300-A, the vesting under Section 20-E and 800 landholders

Article 300-A, Justice Prasad said, protects property from deprivation except by authority of law; it gives no landowner an absolute right to stop an acquisition carried out lawfully for a genuine public purpose. The Railways Act supplies both the authority and the mechanism for compensation. Hardship to individual farmers is real but is to be addressed through compensation and rehabilitation, not by invalidating an otherwise lawful project. Citing Ramniklal N. Bhutta, he said the court must balance individual rights against the wider public interest and remain aware that interference at an advanced stage of acquisition has consequences well beyond the individual dispute.

Two features of the record weighed heavily. The project spread over several villages and a large number of landowners, a substantial number of whom had either consented or accepted compensation; the dissatisfaction of some could not invalidate the whole. And the Section 20-E declaration had already been issued, under which the land vests in the Central Government. Quashing the entire proceeding at that stage would bring a large-scale railway project to a standstill without any established jurisdictional or statutory defect. The petitioners, he noted, did not even allege that the competent authority lacked jurisdiction to begin the acquisition; their grievance was about the manner of consideration and the result. The right under Section 20-D is to object and to have the objection considered in accordance with law; “it is not a right to have the objection accepted”.

The additional objections in the Khillora petition about the pond, school, playground and fragmentation of holdings deserved consideration by the authorities during implementation, the judge said, but the record did not show they had been ignored, the panchayat itself supported the project subject to those protections, and such concerns could be addressed without invalidating the acquisition. In the Kesali petition, the 2024 judgment quashing the in-principle approval for the earlier freight terminal had only directed reconsideration after hearing UltraTech; it did not render a later project under a separate statutory scheme invalid, and the petitioners had not shown the notification was issued without jurisdiction or in breach of that judgment.

Order

The court found that the competent authority had acted within the Railways Act, that the petitioners were heard and their objections considered, and that no illegality or procedural defect warranted interference under Article 226. Neither the order of 27 January 2026 nor the acquisition proceedings under the notification of 16 June 2025 were disturbed, and the prayer for a fresh Section 20-D exercise was refused because one had already been carried out under the court's earlier direction. All four writ petitions were dismissed. The interim order in any of them stands vacated. The dismissal does not prevent the petitioners from pursuing any statutory remedy under the Railways Act on the determination, enhancement or payment of compensation. There was no order as to costs. The order was reserved on 7 August 2026 and is marked not approved for reporting.