The Ghaziabad Development Authority (GDA) has decided to launch a sustained drive from Saturday onwards to free its land and built up properties from the illegal occupants. GDA has identified encroached land and built up areas and has started to lodge First Information Reports (FIRs) against the violators and illegal occupants.

“FIRs are being filed with the police against illegal occupants who are trying to dupe the people by selling their plots without GDA authorisation” GDA secretary Ravendra Madhukar Godbole told The Pioneer.

Godbole said, “A detailed audit was carried out of GDA's entire property records and its physical verification was also conducted. It was found that huge tracts of land, estimated to be over hundreds of crores of rupees, have been grabbed by land sharks and the illegal occupants have occupied its built up flats in the newly developed colonies which are yet to be sold. In some cases, employees have been found supporting squatters and illegal occupants”. In order to drive out the illegal occupants and the encroachers, an effective drive is being launched to evacuate its land and built up flats. Nobody irrespective of their social status would be spared, said Godbole.

There are about 5,000 built up flats and over 250 acre land that has to be freed. Accordingly a plan has been chalked out and the GDA has asked for the police force from the district administration, he added.

Zone wise survey has revealed that some structures have come up on the GDA land for which bulldozers will be used and police force has been requisitioned. In the first phase of the drive, bigger size plots would be freed and in the second phase the medium size land plots would be freed and in the last phase small size land and flats would be freed from illegal occupants, Godbole added.