Farmers say justice first, law institute later!

DOZENS OF farmers whose land has been acquired by the LDA under its Kanpur Road Housing Scheme stopped the ongoing construction work on the Dr Ram Manohar Lohia National Law Institute, a project kicked off by Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav on October 12 last year. The farmers were demanding that they be paid compensation awarded to them by the Supreme Court against their land acquired by the LDA for its Kanpur Road (Bhag III) Housing Scheme.

DOZENS OF farmers whose land has been acquired by the LDA under its Kanpur Road Housing Scheme stopped the ongoing construction work on the Dr Ram Manohar Lohia National Law Institute, a project kicked off by Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav on October 12 last year.

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The farmers were demanding that they be paid compensation awarded to them by the Supreme Court against their land acquired by the LDA for its Kanpur Road (Bhag III) Housing Scheme. Ironically, this was not the first instance of local farmers disrupting the ongoing construction work on the law institute. According to sources, the drama has been going on for the past month but neither the LDA— administration nor the Higher Education Department officials have cared to address the problem so far.

“We were given compensation calculated on Re 1.72 paisa per square feet of our acquired land by the LDA about two decades back. But since the amount was peanuts, we challenged the decision in the High Court, which fixed a land compensation rate of Rs 4.50 paisa per square feet,” said Ramesh Ranjan, who is spearheading the Kisan Union Sangharsh Samiti agitation.

He said the LDA moved an appeal against the HC decision in the Supreme Court, but the latter endorsed the lower court’s ruling in the matter. “But despite the apex court’s decision, we have still not been paid a penny by the LDA,” lamented Ramesh claiming that there were over 1,000 farmers, who were still to receive the enhanced compensation.

Asked why they were stalling the construction work of the law institute as the education department was funding it, the farmers said they had done so deliberately to draw the attention of the CM towards their plight. “We resorted to this desperate measure after all our attempts to apprise the authorities in this connection failed to evoke any response from them,” said another member of the Sangharsh Samiti.

Spread over 40 acres, while the construction work on the law institute is being undertaken by the Rajkiye Nirman Nigam, the project is being given shape under the supervision of the Higher Education Department. “We would ‘gherao’ the district magistrate on January 23 if no action is taken by then on the 9 point memorandum of demand we have given to the authorities,” said Ranjan.