Despite notices, illegal houses mushroom on Aravalli land

Bijendra Ahlawat

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Faridabad, January 1

With hundreds of acres of land in the Aravalli belt becoming an easy target for land mafia, the problem of encroachment and illegal occupation on around 1,426 acres of land here is yet to be addressed in a comprehensive manner.

As per sources in the district administration, a number of farmhouses and residential and commercial properties have mushroomed in the region despite it being designated as “forest land” under the Punjab Land Preservation Act (PLPA), where no construction is allowed.

“Though notices have been served time and again to encroachers in villages such as Kot, Ankhir, Anangpur, Lakadpur and Mewla Maharajpur, no action except removal of some boundary walls and small scale constructions has been taken,” claimed an official on the condition of anonymity. These regions include 44 residential structures in Kant Enclave, which were demolished by the Town and Country Planning in compliance with the Supreme Court order in 2018.

Revealing that the authorities concerned, including the Forest Department, have admitted in affidavits submitted in the NGT in 2020, that around 1426.50 acres of land had been identified as encroached in the region, sources claim that majority of the constructions were still existent and had been posing a major hurdle in the work lingering on for past several years. While around 152 constructions were detected in 2012-13, a survey by the Municipal Corporation had traced 130 farmhouses or banquet halls in 2018-19, it is claimed.

“Though around 9,500 residential structures in a Khori village colony were razed in June 2021, failure to take action against a large number of constructions owned by influential persons, speaks of the dual nature of the policy adopted towards the issue and thus the problem of encroachments and illegal constructions in the Aravali hills is yet to be resolved,” said Sunil Harsana, an ecological activist.