In a major embarrassment to the Mayawati government in Uttar Pradesh, the Allahabad High Court on Thursday set aside notifications issued for acquisition of more than 100 hectares of land in Gautam Buddh Nagar district for “planned industrial development” in Greater Noida.
A division bench comprising Justice Sunil Ambawani and Justice Kashi Nath Pandey, while allowing a bunch of writ petitions filed by residents of Shahberi village in the district, said the entire action of acquiring the land was a “colourable exercise of powers” and ordered return of the land to their owners.
The bench set aside two notifications issued by the state government on 10.6.2009 and 9.11.2009 for acquiring the land.
In the notification dated 10.06.2009, the state government had proposed “to acquire a total area of 156.93 hectares of land in the village while the one dated 9.11.2009, published in the official gazette, had declared the acquisition of land. —PTI