GHAZIABAD: Seventy-seven villages along Delhi-Meerut Expressway (DME) and Eastern Peripheral Expressway (EPE)—some of them in Baghpat’s Kekhra tehsil and others in Loni and Modinagar—will be integrated into the Ghaziabad Development Authority (GDA) for planned development.
The GDA board, which met in Meerut on Tuesday, approved the proposal to assimilate these revenue villages. The integration process will start once UP govt ratifies the plan.
“The NCR Planning Board’s proposal to assimilate 32 revenue villages along EPE and 29 along DME, which are within 500m of the expressways has got the board’s backing now. Sixteen other villages under Hapur-Pilakhua Development Authority will also be integrated with GDA,” GDA secretary Rajesh Kumar Singh said.
The villages, currently under panchayats, have seen unregulated growth due to their proximity to the expressways.
“After a notification from UP govt, GDA will be vested with power to draw up plans as per its building by-laws to ensure the planned growth of the area,” Singh added.
The board also approved GDA’s budget for 2025-26 financial year (FY), which proposes to spend Rs 2,132.23 crore under various heads and expects to mop up a revenue of Rs 2,623.4 crore.
In the FY 2024-25, GDA generated revenue of Rs 1,599.6 crore while it spent Rs 915.7 crore. The board also approved a proposal to extend by one year the decision to freeze the price of 1,531 GDA properties, valued at Rs 534.1 crore, till March 31, 2026.
“In July last year, GDA, with the intent to woo buyers, decided to freeze property rates till March 31, 2025. The board on Tuesday extended it till the next fiscal year,” Singh said. The per unit cost ranges from Rs 5.7 lakh for EWS units to Rs 69.42 lakh in different housing schemes, which offer 1 to 3 BHKs, mini-LIG, LIG and EWS flats.
“GDA board also approved a proposal to relocate 373 plots in pocket E of Madhuban Bapudham residential project. These plots, sold off to buyers by the development authority as park-facing land, currently face a crematorium. Since then, the buyers have been agitating that they be relocated elsewhere within the township,” said Singh.
GDA acquired 800 acres of land for the housing scheme based on mutual consent from farmers. But it was forced to revisit land rates of developed plots after farmers, who hold about 281 acres, moved the Allahabad High Court in 2004. “The farmers first moved the court, saying the land compensation must be awarded to them under the Land Acquisition (Rehabilitation & Resettlement) Act, 2013, but the decision was given in favour of GDA. But in 2007, the aggrieved farmers moved the Supreme Court to challenge HC’s decision.
The SC ruled in favour of the farmers.
The GDA board on Tuesday approved a proposal under which 6% of developed land in the 800 acres acquired from farmers at mutually agreed rates and 20% of the developed 281 acres, which was acquired as per the Land Acquisition Act, will be given to the farmers at a lower rate of at Rs 26,500/sqm, said Singh. A developed plot has amenities such as roads, sewers, shopping complexes, schools and parks.
Source Homevior.in
