WB government violated lease agreement for Singur land: Tata Motors

KOLKATA: Tata Motors today told the Calcutta High Court that the West Bengal government had "violated" the lease agreement for the land at Singur and "unconstitutionally" taken it over by framing an act.

Senior counsel S Pal, submitting before Justice I P Mukerji, stated that the government, instead of giving it notice of termination of lease, had framed the Singur Land Rehabilitation and Development Act 2011 and taken over the land from Tata Motors Ltd (TML).

"This was a violation of the agreement and the law enacted to do so was unconstitutional," Pal said.

The TML counsel said if it was not land acquisition by the state government, as claimed by it, "why was it keeping a provision of compensation".

He said that when a landlord terminated an agreement with a tenant, no compensation was paid, but in case of land acquisition proper compensation had to be paid.

Pal was replying to the submissions made by the state government against TML's challenge of the Singur Act claiming it to be "unconstitutional".

The matter will be taken up for hearing again tomorrow.