GHAZIABAD: Ghaziabad Development Authority (GDA) has prepared a blueprint to develop a land parcel as part of Indirapuram Extension scheme, which was launched two decades ago and had to be shelved following farmers’ protests over land.
Officials said GDA would spend Rs 5 crore to construct roads, sewer network, parks, and other civic amenities.
“The plan covers a total area of 30,000 sqm in this phase. The land will be divided into 47 residential and three commercial plots. The land parcels will be auctioned after they are developed,” said a GDA official.
Apart from roads and drains, the area will have a substation and vertical gardens too. “The land will be demarcated with a 10ft boundary wall. The plots are likely to be auctioned in a year or so,” the official added.
GDA, officials said, is hoping to generate a revenue of over Rs 285 crore from the housing scheme. While residential plots will cost Rs 95,000 a sqm, commercial land parcels will be sold for Rs 1.15 lakh a sqm in keeping with the prevalent circle rate.
It was only in Aug this year that the GDA board passed a proposal to divide the land in the Indirapuram Extension project into smaller plots. The state govt had in 2004 acquired land from farmers in Mohiuddinpur Kanawani village at the rate of Rs 1,100 per sqm. The next year, however, a group of 225 farmers secured a stay from the Allahabad high court on land acquisition, seeking enhanced compensation.
As GDA was unable to take possession of land, the project went into the backburner. Over the years, the housing scheme became financially unviable because of the new Land Acquisition Act, prompting the development authority to shelve it in 2019. It, however, saw a glimmer of hope in the form of a Supreme Court order on May 20, 2022.
In a case involving Ayodhya Development Authority, the apex court said that any issue pertaining to land compensation that was initiated before the new Land Acquisition Act came into existence in 2014 should be dealt with rates prevalent then, irrespective of whether the plots could be acquired or not. The ruling paved the way for GDA to revive the project.
