Delhi Government to regularise extended village abadi areas
A proposal to regularise extension of ‘village abadi’ in 165 villages, under the revised guidelines 2007 related to unauthorised colonies, was tabled before the Cabinet meeting on Monday. The decision is said to be announced on May 15 at a farmer’s rally to be held at Talkatora Stadium in New Delhi.
After seeking the Cabinet’s approval, the proposal will be sent to Minister of Urban Development for approval following which the proposal would again be put forth in the next Cabinet meeting on Saturday, revealed sources.
This move of the Delhi government seems to bring relief to lakhs of village residents. If the proposal gets approved, the areas around these villages will also get the same benefits as availed by main villages. Prices in these village extension areas are sometimes lesser than their adjacent areas. It has to be noted that the building regulations in such areas are different from areas other than demarcated areas.
‘Lal Dora’ refers to the part of village land that falls under abadi (habitation). In olden days, some parts of the land in the village outskirts were used by the village habitation, wherein the villagers used to have their support systems, livestock, etc. Those land areas were supposed to be used only for non-agricultural purposes and were marked by the land revenue department by tying a Red Thread (Lal Dora) around them, in order to distinguish them from agricultural lands.
At present, the term is applicable to 362 villages, among which 227 are classified as rural and 135 are classified as urban villages. Some of the villages include Basant Gaon, Munirka, Yusuf Sarai, Mehrauli, Ujwa, Khampur, Poshangipur, Asalatpur, Rangpuri, Kusumpur, Lado Sarai, Shahpur Jat, Lado Sarai, Shahpur Jat, Rawta, Salharpur, Radhopur, Shikarpur, Surhera, Rajpur Khurd, Tilangpur Kotla, Shafiqpur Ranhola, Basai Darapur, Keshopur, Sherpur Dairy, Rewla Khanpur, Jasola, Meethapur and Fatehpuri.
Habitation has come up even beyond the Lal Dora areas (Phirni), in the village boundaries, and such areas are referred to as ‘extended Lal Dora’ by the advisory group on review of Master Plan – 2021.
Regularising the colonies that came up on extended Lal Dora land will help the residents in easy registration of properties and in carrying out construction works after the approval of building plans.
However, according to the existing norms under the Act, no agricultural land can be used for construction of residential properties and other purposes. The residents of the villages have been demanding to do away with the provision of not allowing agricultural land for other purposes. If this restriction is removed, then it would allow building flats or houses on that land.
The government is also planning to restrict Rule 81 of the Land Acquisition Act, after which the villages will not have to be afraid of receiving notices under the provision, said officials. A separate cabinet note would be brought before the Cabinet on restricting use of Rule 81 of the Land Acquisition Act to provide relief to residents of urbanized villages.
In September 2012, the Delhi government had given green signal to the regularisation of 895 unauthorised colonies but the notification process is still pending. At that time the government had allowed sale and purchase in 312 colonies, existed on private land or private khasra, provided production of NoC from revenue department. Three months later, the Delhi Development Authority (DDA) had approved inclusion of extended Lal Dora areas, which came up till 2007, in the Master Plan-2021. As per the decision those areas were allowed to be given residential status.
With all these changes, the Sheila Dikshit Government is looking for electoral benefits in the upcoming Assembly elections, alleged sources. However the changes would bring in a great relief to the people of village abadi.
