Noida authority releases 295 crore to land owner Reddy

The Noida authority on Sunday said that it has released 295 crore to Veerana Reddy, who owned land in Sector 18 and the same land parcel was allotted for building a shopping mall. The move came after the Supreme Court issued an order in this regard.

The proposal for releasing 295 crore was approved in the 207th board meeting held in November, under the chairmanship of Uttar Pradesh infrastructure and development commissioner Arvind Kumar after the Supreme Court ordered the Noida authority to pay ₹295 crore to the original land owner whose land was acquired in Sector 18.

“We released 295 crore to the original land owner on Friday in accordance with the apex court order,” said a Noida authority official.

The Noida authority had acquired the nearly 7,400 square metre (sqm) plot in 2005, from land owner Reddy, who later objected to the acquisition on the grounds that the compensation offered was “unfair”.

On January 31, 2011, the Gautam Budh Nagar administration decided on a compensation of 1,800,481 (a little over 18 lakh) along with interest at a rate of 181.87 per sqm, which the developer refused. It was the beginning of a long and protracted legal battle between the Noida authority and Reddy, which started at the Gautam Budh Nagar district courts, advanced to the Allahabad high court and eventually reached the Supreme Court.

On May 5, 2022, a Supreme Court bench of justices Vineet Saran and JK Maheshwari, directed the authority to pay a land compensation at the rate of 110,000 per sqm along with an interest of 15% and a penal interest of 3%.