' The petitioners seek a direction to respondents Nos. 1 and 2 to surrender the acquired land to the Collector, Lahore District, Lahore and the petitioners are ready to refund the compensation received by them under rule 14 of the Punjab Land Acquisition Rules, 1983 and respondent No,4, the Province of Punjab by a mandatory order be directed to re-transfer the land to the petitioners. It is further sought that, respondents Nos.1, 2 and 5 be refrained from including the land in question in the assets of Steel Shops to be sold by the process of Privatization and they may be refrained from negotiating the sale of the disputed land or alienating the same in any manner in favour of any other person. On the hand, learned legal advisers of the Pakistan Railways have submitted that the present petitioners 24 in number out of them first eleven petitioners have already filed Writ Petition No, 8832 of 1995 and that this fact was not disclosed in this writ petition.
2. As a rejoinder, learned counsel for the petitioners has drawn my attention to para. 9 of the present writ petition in which it is mentioned that the petitioners in the circumstances mentioned above had filed a Constitutional petition bearing No,8832/1995 challenging the acquisition proceedings and that the said writ petition was pending adjudication and that even at the note a certificate at the end of the writ petition, there is mentioned that writ petition with request to the office to put up the same and that the same is also put up with this petition. Rule 14 of the Punjab Land Acquisition Rules, 1983 reads as under:- "14.---(1) Where any land has been acquired for any Department of the Government or a local authority for a public purpose and it is proposed to abandon the same, it shall be handed over to the Collector who shall be responsible for the disposal of the same in accordance with the orders of the Government.
(2) The disposal of land under sub-rule (1) shall be made by Government its discretion, and its possession restored to the persons from whom it was acquired or to their heirs as under:---
(i) Free of cost to the original owners or their heirs, if compensation for the acquisition of land has not been paid.
(ii) On refusing the amount paid as compensation less than 15 per cent. Granted for compulsory acquisition, if the original landowners or their heirs have already received cash compensation in respect of their land. The price may be lowered, if necessary on account of deterioration, or enhanced in the rare case of land having been improved by the use to which Government has put it..
(3) Where the original landowners or their heirs were provided alternate land in lieu of their acquired land, such land shall not be restored to them, but shall be utilized or disposed of by the Board of Revenue in accordance with the policy of the Government regarding disposal and alienation of lands."
4. Learned legal advisors for the Railways submitted that the attention proceeds is that it is proposed to abandon the same and that the Railways has not proposed to abandon the same and that this thing has been referred in paragraph No,7 of the para wise comments where it was mentioned a boundary wall has since been constructed around the acquired land and Railway track has been extended to stack steel scrap. Moreover, raw material which is used in the casting and in electric furnaces is stacked in underground tanks viz. ,molasses, sodium silicate, besides stacking of lime stone, silica sand, bantonite clay and dolomite clay etc. In the areas. It is further submitted in para. No, 10 that the land in dispute is being properly utilized and that Government can plan its policy to improve the working of Pakistan Railways and that in para. No,12 it was sated that the land is used for the objects connected with steel shops and that in para. No,13 it was stated that the land in dispute is properly used for the purpose it was acquired.
4-A. Arguments have been heard at length.
5. For the time being, there appears to be no action from the side of the. Respondents. If at any stage, they take action in accordance with law and rule 14 of the Punjab Land Acquisition Rules, 1983 is attracted, the rights of the petitioners shall remain fully protected in accordance with law.
They shall also have the rights to file writ petition against the respondents as and when they propose to take action.
6. In the light of this observation without prejudice to the rights of both the parties the writ petition seems to be premature and the same is disposed of accordingly.