Perspectives' visit to Greater Noida

Racing towards Devastation

India is all set to host its first Formula 1 Grand Prix in end of October. An exhilarating combination of adrenaline-charged racing and glamour, the most expensive sport in the world is closely associated with sharply-dressed playboys, glamorous women and never ending parties. . Dance floor tables are priced at Euro 15,000 and VIP tables are priced at Euro 8,950. The swanky track was virtually ready when a team of Perspectives visited Greater Noida some time back. The track falls in Dhankaur area of Greater Noida, which is about 9 km from the Bhatta-Parsaul villages. The grandeur of the track itself and the adjoining area mocked the lack of access road to these twin villages These villages came to light in May this year after four people (two farmers and two jawans of Provincial Armed Constabulary) were shot dead in course of conflict over acquisition of land of the farmers by Yamuna Expressway Industrial Development Authority (YEA).

These villages are but part of many villages in the Gautam Budh Nagar district of Uttar Pradesh where fertile agricultural lands have been acquired by the government for one or another reason.  Greater Noida Industrial Development Authority (GNIDA) acquired land belonging to eleven villages of the same district and sold the same to builders of housing societies. On 6^th July, the Supreme Court upheld a judgment of the Allahabad High Court, quashing both, the process of acquisition of land and the use of the ‘urgency clause’ for this acquisition (See Box). Since then, cases of such kind pending in the Allahabad High Court have picked up much publicity and new cases have been filed by farmers who had their land acquired in a similar manner.

To investigate and develop a first-hand understanding of the issue, a 13 member Perspectives team visited three villages of Greater Noida on 25^th September, 2011. The first village we visited was Bisrakh where land has been acquired by GNIDA. Apart from this, we also visited the villages of Bhatta and Parsaul where land acquisition was carried out by YEA.

The Noida and Greater Noida areas in Gautam Budh Nagar district of Uttar Pradesh were notified under the Uttar Pradesh Industrial Area Development Act, 1976 to usher in planned development in these areas. For this task, several authorities - NOIDA (New Okhla Industrial Development Authority formed in 1976), GNIDA (Greater Noida Industrial Development Authority formed in 1991) and Yamuna Expressway Authority (formed in 2006),  have been set up with the specific task of setting up industries, housing, roads, etc in certain earmarked areas that fall under the respective authority. As part of planned development that is promoted in these notified areas the Authorities are entrusted with the task of making an extensive plan for usage of land. The notification of an area restricts the residents from carrying out construction on any land other than the abadi or homestead land or from selling their own land for non-agricultural purposes without an NOC (No Objection Certificate) from the concerned Authority.

Industrial Authorities sans Industry

Bisrakh is one of the eleven villages which received acquisition notice from Greater Noida Industrial Development Authority between 2007 and 2009. 608 hectares of land of this village was acquired by GNIDA and then sold to the builders. The resentment of the villagers was written large on their faces as we settled into a conversation with them in the house of the village Pradhan, Ajay Bhatti. Ever since the area was notified in 1991, the farmers were resigned to the fact that their lands may be taken over but they cannot accept the mockery wherein their lands are being taken away in order to construct middle and high income houses. They have been left high and dry whereas GNIDA and the private builders are making explosive profits. Mr. Bhati told the team that eleven villages in Greater Noida had received acquisition notices between 2007 and 2009 viz. Bisrakh, Shahberi, Patwari, Roza Yakubpur, Ghori Bachera, Tusiana, Ghanghola, Iteda, Badalpur (Chief Minister Mayawati’s ancestral village), and Haibatpur.

Bisrakh is predominantly Gujjar village with Jatav, Sapera, Prajapati, Muslims, Nai and Valmiki being the other communities. We were told that the village has centuries old history and is the birthplace of Ravana’s father, Bisrakha. This village had remained unaffected even during the devastating floods of 1976 and prior to the recent acquisition; the farmers were cultivating three crops annually.

At the time of acquisition, GNIDA had made the villagers believe that these lands would be used to set up industries and they would get jobs. Within three months, however, the land was sold to private real estate developers after changing the land use. The villagers told us that had the land been acquired for a school or a factory and had they been paid their due compensation, they would not have had a problem with it. In this area, landowners were given compensation by GNIDA at the rate of Rs 850 per square metre (and that too after their opposition to the initial rate) while the Authority sold the same to builders at a whopping Rs 17,000 per square metre! The land belonging to the Gram Sabha of this village (1500 bighas) and the land on which check roads (between the farms) had been built had also been acquired by the Authority and for free since there was no owner of this land. Yet the most unjust part of this entire acquisition process perhaps remains the fact that GNIDA used the urgency clause of the Land Acquisition Act (LAA) in order to acquire the land. The urgency in handing over the land to real estate developers escaped our comprehension.

The farmers of the area have been spearheading an agitation against this acquisition under the banner of Kisan Sangharsh Samiti. Manveer Bhatti, a leader of the samiti told us that after the court cases, now the farmers are being offered 11 per cent of the developed land which means that they will have to buy back their own land and pay development charges as well! Although the abadi (homestead) land may remain with them but the area is likely to face acute water crisis with the builders undertaking dewatering from 50 feet under the ground in order to carry on construction. Our team also met the landless labourers in the village who are largely Valmikis and Prajapatis. These families used to work as agricultural labourers on the farms prior to their acquisition. Apart from the wages, they could get milk by rearing some cattle. Additionally, they had the security of being able to take credit from the farmers at times of distress. All this stands changed now. Some of them have taken up odd jobs at construction sites but their vulnerability has increased multifold.

Expressway to disaster/destitution

During the drive to Bhatta-Parsaul, we saw swanky roads, roundabouts with very expensive statues, a knowledge park and residential areas named after the Greek alphabets.  Again there was no industry. The entire stretch of 250 kilometres from Greater Noida to Agra has been acquired by YEA and handed over to infrastructure company, Jaypee group. The group has been entrusted with the construction of Yamuna Expressway (erstwhile Taj Expressway). An ambitious 6-lane (extendable to 8 lanes) access-controlled Expressway is conceived with the idea of reducing the travel time between NCR and Agra. The Yamuna Expressway Industrial Development Authority (YEA), the nodal body overseeing the project, wants to develop 44,000 hectares of land. Of this only 9.3 per cent has been utilized for the expressway and the rest has been divided into ‘land parcels’ to be sold off to other builders and real estate developers. According to the agreement between Jaypee and the UP government, Jaypee has the rights to collect tolls on the Expressway for 36 years and rights for ‘developing’ about 25 million square meters of land along the Expressway. Land (including 100 meters for the Expressway) at five or more locations with an area of 5 million square meters along the Expressway for commercial, amusement, industrial, institutional and residential development would be offered on acquisition cost on lease for a period of 90 years. The agreement between Jaypee and the state government is the simple case of ‘quid pro quo’ wherein the private real estate companies are sought for developing infrastructure and in return the government instead of paying the company provides them with  land parcels that can be developed for any purposes (public or otherwise) the company deems fit to recover its ‘investment’. Hence the ‘development’ and sale of plots around the Expressway.

The only casualty in this grand design are the farmers and other villagers whose lands have been acquired. Sarvadaliya Sangharsh Samiti decided to oppose this unjust acquisition after farmers received a cruel shock when they were told that their lands (with standing crops ) was already sold off on the paper as ‘plots’ by the Jaypee group. The villagers of Bhatta- Parasaul got together on 17^th January, 2011 and sat on a dharna outside the village. On the night of 18th January the police charged on the sleeping protestors, arrested some and left in the morning. After this incident, the police called the villagers to the Dankaur police station. There they beat up the villagers also detained their leader Manvir Singh Tewatia. The villagers in turn took hostage, one of the officials to attempt an exchange for Tewatia and were attacked by the police. From 1^st -3^rd February about 50-60 women and 250 men rallied against this attack despite the fear of further repression. On 21^st February, PAC came to the dharna site and began firing. The agitation took a serious turn starting from 7^th May, 2011. Two farmers and as many jawans of Provincial Armed Constabulary (PAC) were killed in clashes. The police went berserk, killed people, burnt standing crop on 10 bighas, misbehaved with the women. There are allegations of rape as well. Rahul Gandhi’s visit on the 11^th May halted the repression temporarily. On 9^th July, 2011, UP police arrested Manvir Singh Tevatia. As of now Tevatia and 9 others are lodged in Dasna jail in Ghaziabad and Tevatia has sedition charges against him. An additional 250 unknown people have been named in the FIR which has provided a license to the police to continue harassing the villagers.

Even today, the people of the two villages of Bhatta –Parsaul live with the terror of attacks by the police. We were told that even now, the police keeps picking up people indiscriminately.   There is a police camp next to the village and people are not even allowed to go to the local market. The anxiety, fear as well as anger of the villagers was palpable. In fact, one of the villagers thought it was the police, when he heard the sound of our vehicles. Some of the women narrated to us the horror of the two days when police led the attack on their villages. They said the first village to get attacked was Parsaul. As soon as people in Bhatta realized the intention of the police, they fled. Families were separated in the chaos. Most of the men disappeared from the village instantly. Many are still absconding, hiding out in homes of distant relatives. Women, children and even animals took shelter in the fields nearby, lying without food and water for two days and nights.

The demands by the villagers of Greater Noida include return of 80 per cent of the land back to the farmers, ¼ th of the jobs created to be given to the farmers and 120 m of plots to be given to the landless. Recently they have added the demand of return of 25 per cent of the developed land back to the farmers. Although some people from these villages have already taken their compensation and bought land in other areas like Pilibhit (Uttarakhand), everyone is not in a situation to do so.  Most of these farmers are the bigger land owners, with compensation money being enough for them to settle elsewhere if they should so chose. Farmers with small land holdings, however, are usually unable to use this compensation to create an alternative life for themselves because of the sheer smallness of compensation amounts.

Our team came back wondering about the lack of industrialisation by the various Industrial Development Authorities. Do housing projects and F1 tracks constitute industrialisation? And what about fertile agricultural land and food security? Most importantly, what about the people for whom these lands have been the source of livelihood for many generations? We got our answers on seeing a newspaper report on a proposed sports tournament on the spot being planned by the villagers of Dankaur as a mark of protest against the F1 race. A village leader from Dankaur and one of the chief organisers of the event, said, “The event is symbolic in nature. We gave up our land in the hope that industries would come up and provide employment to our people. As it turns out, our demands have been absolutely ignored. After taking away our livelihood, the administration has not provided our children with any alternative sources of employment.”