The residents have also been booked for illegally acquiring and encroaching land.
Over 200 residents of Shiv Shakti Enclave, a residential colony based in Sector 81C Noida, held a protest outside Sector 81 metro station in Noida on Tuesday. Their protest comes a day after the Noida Authority had served them an eviction notice under the Public Property Act of 1984.
Residents alleged, despite an on-going case regarding the land, the authority has filed a First Information Report (FIR) against 116 residents of the colony on Monday and served them an eviction notice.
As many as 200 protesters demanded the authority to withdraw the FIR and eviction notice against them.
"We bought this land from our money, we have registry papers in our name, yet we are being falsely accused of encroaching a public land," a resident said.
The FIR was registered on August 18 in Noida Phase-II police station by the complainant Sunder Lal, a Junior Engineer at the Noida Authority.
As per the FIR, the 116 residents of the colony have been booked under Section 3 ( mischief causing damage to public property ) and 5 ( no person accused or convicted of an offence punishable under section 3 or section 4 shall, if in custody, be released on bail ) of the Public Property Act of 1984.
The residents have been booked for illegally acquiring and encroaching a land which is the property of the Noida Authority, but according to the residents they had bought the land from farmers via property dealers and have all the legal papers like registry and deeds with them.
The colony also has a registered Resident Welfare Association (RWA), which was formed in 2018, said SN Rawat, the secretary of the RWA who told our reporter that the khasra number mentioned in the FIR is not the one on which the residents are currently living.
According to the FIR, the mentioned khasra’s are 240, 241, 224 to 228, 199 to 201, 257, 258, 267, 274, 275 and 276.
But as per the residents, they own and have even built their houses from khasra number 218 to 223 and 231, which according to a reply to an RTI is not included in the acquisition plan of the Noida Authority.
They also handed over a copy of the RTI acquired through the Right to Information Act from the concerned department to our reporter.
Shiv Shakti Enclave has an occupancy of over 400 families who have been living without any basic facilities since 2015.
Deepak Sharma, the RWA President said, “Whatever facility that of electricity or the kaccha road in the premises has been constructed through the residents' contribution."
“All roads including the main road and the entrance of the colony are swampy and in monsoon, the roads are flooded, there is no drainage system in the colony because of which more problems occur”, a female resident of the colony said.
As one enters the premises of the Shiv Shakti Enclave, the first thing that can be noticed is the inaccessible road and stink emanating from the garbage heaps.
Asked as to when the garbage is picked, the residents said that the colony has no garbage pick-up service from the Noida Authority and they are responsible to dispose-off their waste themselves.
An older resident said that while the plots were being bought the dealer had promised to construct the road and give bare minimum facilities like electricity and water but everything here is done by us.
He added, “We installed the borewell for water, electric poles for electricity and even tried laying the road."
“There have been several accidents because of the marshy roads," he concluded.
According to the residents, they had approached the authorities to construct at least the main road but they were told that the area they live in comes under kaccha road and cannot be constructed.
“We have invested everything we had in buying this land, we will have nothing if this is taken from us," a resident said.
Another resident added, “We all are individual buyers, why are we being harassed? Why have they registered an FIR against our name? What have we done? We paid our hard-earned money and bought the land? Was it a mistake to dream to have a house?
The resident further questioned as to where the authority was when they were building their houses in 2015, when the property was being transferred in their name or when they were registering their RWA.
"I am a middle-class man, have two school-going children, they have named me in the FIR, I will lose my job if my company comes to know, but I will fight for my children's future," said another resident on the condition of anonymity.
The residents are also running an online campaign on Twitter and seeking help from the authorities.
CitySpidey tried to get in touch with the official's version through email (ceo@noidaauthorityonline.com) and personal visit to the office of the CEO of Noida Authority but we are yet to receive any official version from the authorities on the pertaining matter.
