Section 76A. If real estate has been divided by sale, mortgage, upon a petition for partition or otherwise and such division has been duly recorded in the registry of deeds, and such real estate has been taken or sold for failure to pay a tax assessed on it as a whole, the land court, upon petition by the owner or mortgagee of any portion thereof, may, after notice to all other persons interested in any portion of such real estate, permit the petitioner to redeem the portion in which he is interested, in the manner provided by section seventy-six, upon such terms as it may deem just and equitable both toward the petitioner and toward such other persons.

If the plat of a proposed subdivision of land taken or sold for failure to pay a tax assessed on it as a whole, in any city or town having a planning board established under section eighty-one A of chapter forty-one, or in any other city or town which has a board of survey and has accepted the subdivision control law, has been approved by such planning board or board of survey and such approval has been filed in the office of such planning board or board of survey, or if, in any other city or town, the plan of a proposed subdivision of land so taken or sold has been duly recorded in the registry of deeds, the land court, upon petition by the owner or mortgagee of the whole of the land or any portion thereof for redemption of any subdivision thereof, may, after notice to all other persons interested in such land, permit the petitioner to redeem such subdivision, in the manner provided by section seventy-six, upon such terms as it may deem just and equitable both toward the petitioner and toward such other persons, provided it finds that such redemption will not adversely affect the interests of the city or town in which such land is situated. Such redemption may be permitted whether the approval of the plat or the recording of the plan was before or after said tax taking or sale.