Farmers set to move SC; the final decision to be taken at today’s panchayat meeting.
A day after the Allahabad High Court decided on the Noida and Greater Noida land acquisition issue, there was a lull in most villages. All are awaiting the panchayat meeting tomorrow which would decide on when to move the Supreme Court against the verdict. “There is a consensus to move the Supreme Court and the final decision will be taken in tomorrow’s panchayat meeting in the morning,” said Manveer Bhatti of Bisrakh village in Greater Noida.
According to builders that Business Standard spoke to, buyers were not approaching them as they are happy. “Maybe they do not know what is coming,” said Manoj Gaur, managing director, Gaursons Limited, one of the developers with a strong presence in the area.
There was a near consensus among the builders that they would pass on the additional burden to the buyers. Most developers point at a minimum 20 per cent rise in the cost for the customers, as the court ordered a 64.7 per cent increase in compensation to the farmers in 61 villages. Developers were, however, divided on whether the current customers will have to pay more or not.
Also, the developers’ association is planning to negotiate with the Greater Noida Industrial Development Authority (GNIDA) to lighten their burden. “We will request the authorities for a middle path between the developers and authorities, if the cost burden is a lot, which will alter the whole idea of affordable housing”, said Aman Gupta, ED, RG Group, an affected builder.
There are 78 projects and more than 30 builders across these villages. Among the major builders here are Amrapali, Supertech, Gaursons, RG Group, Panchsheel, Rudra, Paramount, Patel, Ajnara and Nirala, to name some.
Where some developers assure that there will be no price hike for the existing buyers, others said, that burden would fall on the existing customers, too. “A fraction of additional cost will fall on our existing buyers as well, maybe by 15-20 per cent as they are the final allottees”, said Gaur, as he points at the legal clause which says that any additional compensation has to be borne by the allottees.
Gaursons has a major project in Haibatpur village in Greater Noida, where nearly 70 per cent construction is complete.
Gupta of RG Group said even if we exclude the cost burden from the additional compensation, even then the cost for the future buyers would rise by minimum 20 per cent. “Our sales have been stalled for the past six months, still the construction is on. Buyers are not paying instalments for almost half a year now, all this will add to the cost burden”, according to Gupta. However, he maintained that no cost burden would fall on existing customers.
Supertech Group also had no burden in store for the existing buyers, but, it’s chairman and managing director, R K Arora added: “This applies to those customers that are paying the instalments well in time, and fulfiling all the commitments as per the buyer-builder agreement.”
There is bad news for the new buyers according to Arora, as the prices are set to climb 30-40 per cent if the compensation weighs down on the developers.
Another farmer of Patwari village said, it was never about increased compensation, we always wanted our ancestral houses back, where the HC was silent in its judgement.
GNIDA had said yesterday that additional burden from 64.7 per cent compensation would be to the tune of Rs 3,000-4,000 crore that would be claimed from the current and future allottees of land including builders, institutions and industries.
The Allahabad High Court yesterday annulled land acquisition in three villages (Deola, Chak Shahberi and Asadullahpur) of Noida and Greater Noida in Uttar Pradesh. There are no residential or commercial projects in this area.
