'Farmers - a distressed lot; allow them to survive,' Supreme Court rejects Karnataka's plea against enhanced compensation for acquiring land

New Delhi: The Supreme Court has pulled up the Karnataka government over challenging correctness of its High Court's order enhancing compensation up to Rs 5 lakh for per acre of land acquired for the purpose of construction of Hipparagi major irrigation project on Krishna River.

A bench of Justices Surya Kant and Ujjal Bhuyan dismissed the plea by the state government, saying the farmers are a distressed lot and the state, where thousands of farmers died by suicides annually, must allow them to survive.

The court also said the state acquired the land but was not ready to pay the farmers a fair compensation.

"The farmers are a distressed lot. If you want to pay the enhanced compensation, why don't you return the land," the bench told the state counsel.

According to the state government's data, a total of 1216 farmers have died by suicides between April 1, 2024, and August 4, 2024. Between 2013 and 2022, a total of 8245 farmers died by suicide due to various reasons.

In its plea, the state government claimed the landowners had already received enhanced compensation as ordered by the reference court and they were not entitled to a rate fixed almost after a decade.

The state government also claimed the order to pay enhanced compensation would put a huge financial burden upon the state.

The state was also aggrieved with the High Court's order as it also extended the direction to pay the enhanced compensation to other farmers whose lands were acquired for the project.