The Allahabad High Court today deferred till July 26 its hearing on a petition challenging the acquisition of more than 460 hectares of land in a village in Gautam Budh Nagar district. The court may club all such petitions on July 26.
A division bench comprising judges Amitava Lala and Ashok Kumar Srivastava deferred the hearing on petitions filed by farmers of Roza-Yaqoobpur village, who had challenged the acquisition of 468 hectares of land by the Greater Noida Industrial Development Authority in 2007-08.
According to the petitioners’ counsel Pankaj Dubey, the court “is likely to club all related matters, including the acquisition of 608 hectares of land in Bisrakh-Jalalpur village which was listed for tomorrow and hear them together on July 26.” Eleven villages in Greater Noida constitute what is known as ‘Noida Extension’.
Noida-based lawyer Parveen Singh Bhatti, who had also appeared on behalf of the petitioners, told news agency PTI, “the farmers have challenged the state government's acquisition proceedings, wherein land was acquired invoking Section 4 (17) of the Land Acquisition Act. The authorities had invoked this urgency clause for all land acquisition in the area, without giving farmers an opportunity to file objections.
“The farmers’ contention is that they should not have been deprived of an opportunity to file their objections, by invoking the emergency clause, which was the only way they could have bargained for an acceptable rate of compensation,” he said.
Earlier yesterday, the high court had set aside the acquisition of nearly 590 hectares of land in Patwari and Deola villages in the district. The order comes barely a fortnight after the Supreme Court had upheld its order dated May 12, 2011, whereby acquisition of more than 150 hectares in Sahberi village was quashed.
The Allahabad High Court judgment, cancelling the land acquisition in three villages in Noida Extension area is a severe blow to developers and many first-time home buyers in the area, where 250,000 flats are being built at a cost of nearly Rs 50,000 crore.
HOME BUYERS SEEK RELIEF
Meanwhile, the recently-formed Noida Extension Flat Buyers Welfare Association (NEFBWA) today filed a petition in the Allahabad High Court pleading it to hear them before deciding on the land acquisition issue. “We have requested the court to hear our views before deciding Noida Extension petition,” NEFBWA Secretary L Sagar said.
The high court is scheduled to hear the petitions of farmers from the five villages of Bisrakh, Haibatpur, Devla, Ghanghola and Iteda tomorrow, but these cases could be clubbed and heard on July 26, say lawyers.
REALTORS SEEK RECONCILIATION
The National Real Estate Development Council (Naredco), an apex body of real estate developers in the country, has appealed for a reconciliation between farmers and the Greater Noida authority and a lenient approach by the courts since housing projects and infrastructure were under construction and thousands of home buyers ploughed their savings to buy a house.
“Since construction by developers and external infrastructure by the Greater Noida Development Authority are already in progress and a substantial expenditure has been made, the courts at this juncture should take into account the larger issue of protecting the interest of all stakeholders — farmers, home buyers and the developers,” it said.
Naredco has suggested a reasonable increase in the compensation package for farmers and re-acquisition of land by the authority. It suggests the authority should come up with a mid-course correction plan for the courts. “It is important to restore confidence of general public in the institution of public-private partnership where the state has acquired land and sold to developers,” Naredco Director General R R Singh said in a statement.
The sale price of flats booked is on the basis of investment in land, construction and capital mobilisation and hence the burden of the increased cost will have to be shared by all the stakeholders, Naredco said.
“No developer would have ever visualised that land allotted by government would fail in legal scrutiny. We request UP government to resolve the issue with the court in the best interest of all stake holders,” it said.
