When the land acquisition controversy in Noida Extension surfaced, there was a general feeling that proposed investment in the township will now move to Gurgaon. Industry experts believed that Dwarka Expressway (also known as Northern Peripheral (NPR) Expressway) will be the biggest beneficiary. As many as nearly two dozen builders launched their projects over there. And now the general apprehension is that Dwarka Expressway too soon go the Noida Extension way.
If the increasing litigation in the region is any indication, Dwarka Expressway seem to be sitting on a bomb waiting to explode any time now. One-third of this 18-km stretch is under litigation, which is why construction work has not even begun on this 5.5km stretch. This Rs 44-crore project was awarded to India Bulls, but it seems unlikely that the March 31, 2012 deadline for completion of projects will be met.
Only 12.5km of this 150-metre wide road is free of litigation and it’s being built as a six-lane expressway.
“I understand it’s not possible to develop anything without land, but why push the petitioners against the wall to sell their land at 10-15% of market value? The state came up with the plan to build the NPR expressway in 2006. We are almost at the end of 2011. If the Government was pro-development, they would have purchased our land at market price and completed the project by now. Instead, they involved builders, who derived maximum gains by conveniently buying land all around expressway,” said Rohit Gulati, a petitioner.
Gulati was forced to sell 2 acres for Rs 60 lakh per acre – a pittance when compared to Rs 4 crore per acre, the current value of such plots in the area.
Now, the matter is being heard at the Punjab and Haryana High Court. Shailendra Jain, the petitioners’ counsel, alleged that the state has shifted the road alignment to benefit the builders. “After notifying one alignment in the draft plan, the Government changed the alignment in the final plan,” he alleged.
Nevertheless, experts have talked about a shift in the realty market. Noida Extension is no longer the focal point of realty development. Property developers are moving to other areas in the NCR.
Unlike Noida where those affected are mainly end users, who purchased property due to affordability, in Gurgaon, majority buyers are investors. This is ascribed to the wide difference in realty prices in both the areas, which is contributed by the different density norms in Haryana and UP.
