GMADA scraps land acquisition, slams brakes on Eco City-3

Pandemic delayed acquisition; fund crunch, poor response to land pooling scheme by farmers also to blame

MOHALI:FACING shortage of funds, poor response to its land pooling scheme and lately failing to get extension for acquisition, the Greater Mohali Area Development Authority (GMADA) has scrapped land acquisition for its Urban Estate Eco City-3 project at New Chandigarh, Mullanpur, bringing the project to a halt.

The last date to begin the acquisition was April 12. However, the Covid-19 lockdown affected its progress and the state government did not allow extension.

Under the project, GMADA had proposed to have residential, commercial and institutional properties after acquiring 322 acres in six villages — Rajgarh, Takipur, Kartarpur, Kansala and Hoshiarpur. As of February, only 118 of 450 landowners had opted for land pooling.

“The acquisition process has been scrapped as we have not got extension due to the Covid-19 lockdown. We may issue a fresh notification in future, but as of now the process is stalled. We will write a letter to the deputy commissioner informing him about the status,” said Sanjeev Kumar, estate officer, GMADA.

Another senior GMADA officer, on the condition of anonymity,

said the previous date was postponed due to poor response to the land pooling scheme and fund crunch, but now the lockdown had forced the scheme shut.

Under the Land Pooling Policy 2013, farmers are offered housing and commercial sites in lieu of their land.

For instance, in case of acquisition of eight kanals, the landowner has two options: To either choose a 1,000 square yards developed residential site and a 200 square yards developed SCO site or a 500 square yards residential site with a 300 square yards SCO site.

“Farmers did not find the prospect fruitful as they did not expect their properties to attract buyers due to the real estate market slump. Many of them are also cautious of investing with GMADA, as it has yet to even develop Eco City-2, for which the same scheme was rolled out five years ago,” a landowner said, wishing not to be named.

In November last year, GMADA had approved the rates of acquisition for 322 acres in five villages, with compensation for farmers fixed between ₹1.8 crore and ₹2.4 crore per acre, depending on the village.

The project, announced in 2016, was initially delayed as farmers did not show any interest. Later, a fresh notification was issued in December last year.

GMADA has already extended the date for acquisition of 737 acres for another township, Aerotropolis, till November this year. The township is spread over 5,400 acres, an expansion of GMADA’S Aerocity near the Chandigarh International Airport.

Other GMADA townships are Knowledge City and IT City, also close to the airport, and Eco City-1 and 2, Edu City and Medi City, all in New Chandigarh.