A grey stone wall with iron spikes demarcates around 100 bighas of land from the rest of Badalpur village.
On the other side of the wall and the closed black gates, windows of a palatial two-storeyed house – painted pink – glitter in the sun.
Another rounded mega structure is coming up fast alongside. Village talk is it is going to be a temple for Kanshi Ram and Babasaheb Ambedkar.
This is Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati’s farmhouse in her native village, where she lived till the age of seven. Two police constables are on duty on the gates and no one is allowed in. The landlady of the house in front of Mayawati’s mansion is worried. “Don’t go there. The government may seize my property”, she tells our photographer.
A few kilometres from this spot, hundreds of angry villagers had gathered on a sultry Tuesday afternoon. They were anxious too. For the last one year or so, there has been a tussle between a large section of the village and the district administration over the issue of land acquisition for development. But this is not Orissa or West Bengal or Haryana or any other part of India where villagers are protesting against acquisition of farmland for industry or special economic zones.
This is Mayawati’s Uttar Pradesh, where the chief minister wants around 400 hectares from four villages to create the mother of all gardens. The strategic location of the green belt, locally referred as “picnic spot”, will ensure that Mayawati’s farmhouse, which she hasn’t visited even once, will have a view of a sea of green.
But the problem is that locals like Ishwar Prasad Sharma and Shyamlal now realise that their land is prime property and are reluctant to dedicate it, even to their beloved Behenji, for peanuts.
The four targeted villages—Badalpur, Bishnuli, Sadulpur and Achenja—are expected to contribute around 400 hectares to make Mayawati’s house greener. But these villages lie on the two sides of National Highway 91, barely 20 km from Delhi. The government is offering them Rs 711 per square metre while the market rate is Rs 4,500-5,000 per square metre and rising.
The locals staged a protest today but the administration ensured there were more policemen than protesters. A mild cane-charge in the beginning and many villagers decided to stay home. “I don’t want to sell my land. But I didn’t take part in the protest out of fear”, says Kartar Singh of Badalpur. He voted for the Bahujan Samaj Party in the Assembly election in 2004.
The Uttar Pradesh Congress unit had planned to join the protest to add political colour. Former chief minister of Madhya Pradesh, Digvijay Singh, UP Congress chief Rita Bahuguna Joshi and MP Sachin Pilot were on their way Badalpur, but Mayawati imposed Section 144 and the Congress bandwagon was sent back when it entered the state.
Shivkant Dwivedi, ADM of Gautam Buddh Nagar (Noida), says: “This situation is created by a few people. The NOIDA CEO has called four-five rounds of meetings to sort out the issue but they (the villagers) have refused to attend. We will retain 6 per cent land to build new houses for the displaced population. Another 17 per cent land will be reserved for this population in local housing projects.”
“Most villagers and actual landowners have come and taken the compensation. Already, we have distributed compensation of more than Rs 10 crore. More than 150 landowners have taken their compensation. We expect to hand over the cheques to 50-60 more people in the next couple of days. We were distributing compensation cheques till 12 o’clock last night”, Dwivedi added.
“Nonsense”, says Budhsingh Verma, owner of 32 bighas of land in Saadulpur. “Only some outsiders have sold their land out of fear. I have a large family with five sons and ten grandchildren. I have spent Rs 20 lakh to build the house. How will I build a new house? Why doesn’t the government send me to Iraq. Let me die there.”
Adds Ishwar Prasad Sharma: “I have 1.66 acres land. The government is offering around Rs 56 lakh per acre whereas the market rate is far more. She has made a bungalow on 10.5 acres and recently bought another 10.5 acres . She will live in over 20 acres of land while we are going to have no land for our future generation.”
