Poor farmers’ mortgaged land was auctioned by officials of the District Co-operative Agricultural and Rural Development Bank on meagre prices without notifying them. A plot of land worth Rs1,600 crore was sold only for Rs1.70 crore to various officials.
land of 160 poor farmers who took loan from Co-operative central bank where cheated by auctioning their lands without notifying them on cheap rates. If a farmer took a loan of Rs12,000 for his cow, his 4.55 acre land worth Rs5 lakh was sold at a rate of mere Rs50,000. Similar was the condition of all the farmers. This auction started somewhere in 2001 and continued till 2007 and engulfed all the farm lands around Bhopal.
This first came into notice when Meva bai of Chanderi and Chhagan (Ratatal) brought this matter to light of former chairman of Bhopal Co-operative Central Bank Vijay Tiwari.
While talking to media persons here on Tuesday, Tiwari said that he had immediately informed Minister of corporative Gopal Bhargav. As the investigation proceeded, the whole matter came into light. The land of 160 farmers worth Rs1,600 crore has been auctioned without anyone’s notice.
In this matter Government has initiated an investigation and pacified them saying that their land will be returned. However, the matter is legally twisted and farmers are forced to push the case to the court.
In this case two farmers, Akbari Bano and Azam Khan reached Supreme Court and their case was taken by advocate Prashant Bhushan and group, free of cost. It is their effort that brought the decision in favor of the farmers.
They have further appealed that the decision in case of Akbari Bano and Azam Khan to be made a law and applied in the case of all the farmers.
They also requested that the culprits must be found and necessary action must be taken against them.