MSRDC faced resistance, court case before offering 5-time compensation

Nagpur: Officials of the Maharashtra State Road Development Corporation (MSRDC) had to face stiff opposition from villagers who often hurled abuses at them when approached for acquiring their land for the Samruddhi expressway project.
After a series of parleys and even a petition filed by some of the villages in the court, villagers finally got a five-time compensation over and above basic valuation of their land. Some of the villagers had to prove that their area does not have any facilities of an urban region. A part of the area has been marked as metro region. However, there is a provision for higher payout on five time basis only for rural lands.
The state government began with an offer of land pooling. Under the plan, persons whose land was taken over were to get a periodic annuity up to 10 years. Farmers outrightly rejected the plan. The government then offered to directly buy the land at two times the basic valuation which was derived from the last three years’ transactions.
A number of villagers agreed but over 40 persons from different villages in Nagpur district filed a petition in the court. There were two-three hearings but before the court’s verdict the government came up with an offer of five times of the value. Everyone agreed to this, said sources involved the process.
Sources said the acquisition starts from Datala, Wadgaon and Sukhli villages off Wardha Road. There are pockets like the Sukhli village where almost each of the person whose land was taken over got at least a crore, said sources. After that MSRDC took up a series of counselling sessions on sound investment. The villagers were asked to buy land with the money they got, instead of splurging it.
Kawdu Bhoyar from Sukhli village, who got Rs5.5 crore, said earlier they had the offer of land pooling scheme. “That would have barely got around Rs10,000 an acre during a year. We did not agree. Then there was an offer for a two-time compensation, to which some agreed. However, I was among those 40-odd who went to the court. Hardly a couple of hearings happened and the government declared five-time compensation,” he said and added that in Sukhli, land of about 25 persons was taken over.
Even villagers in other districts showed similar opposition till the five-time compensation was declared, said a source.