The Noida Authority on Friday bulldozed encroachments into common spaces by several apartment owners in Grand Omaxe housing society, where a spat between politician Shrikant Tyagi and another resident over the same issue had triggered a major row last month. Tyagi was arrested after he was caught on tape abusing and shoving a woman who protested when palm trees were being planted in the open space in front of his ground-floor apartment.
The razing of encroachments, mostly temporary constructions outside ground-floor apartments, came in the wake of a 48-hour notice by the authority after more than a dozen palm trees were again transplanted outside Tyagi's apartment on Tuesday despite police presence. Multiple excavators and around half a dozen dumper trucks were used to demolish the encroachment in the Sector 93B society, Noida authority officials said.
The officials reached Grande Omaxe with excavators and trucks around 10.30 pm but were met with resistance by a section of residents sitting at the front gate of the society. While some residents carried posters and pleaded with the officials not to proceed with the demolition, some questioned the legality of the action. The officials accompanied by scores of police and rapid action force personnel entered the society around 1 pm from an alternate gate. The residents continued to plead to the officials even as the bulldozers razed down more than two dozen illegal structures on the ground floor. They also uprooted 11 of the 15 palm trees which were transplanted outside Tyagi's apartment on Tuesday. "After the initial resistance, there was no law and order situation in the process. Adequate security personnel has been deployed," ACP (Central Noida 1) Abdul Qadir said.
Following the Tuesday incident, the residents of the society who had objected to the plantation in the common area in August once again expressed concern over the encroachment. A team of Noida Authority officials, which rushed to the spot the same afternoon, warned the Tyagi family to have the trees removed in two days or the officials would be forced to "remove the encroachment" themselves. As the trees were being removed on Friday, Anu Tyagi, wife of Shrikant Tyagi, and her relatives opposed the demolition team by standing between the palm trees and the JCB.
"I am saying people's houses should not be demolished. Initially, also we said neither we are wrong nor others, but earlier I was alone so no one listened to us," she said. "I am sad that today parts of several people's houses are being demolished," she said, adding, "I only said that the same norms should be applied to all. Do with us what is done with others and vice versa."
At another nearby tower, a bulldozer razed down at least four 25-foot tall trees which had been planted in a common area. An advocate, also a resident of the society, questioned the legality of the Noida Authority's action. "Notices had already been served and a warning issued two days ago to all the residents who were found to have encroached common areas," Noida Authority's General Manager (Planning) Ishtiaq Ahmed, who was at the site, told reporters. He added that the officials had all requisite legal documents to carry out the demolition.
Earlier this week, scores of people from the Tyagi community staged a protest in support of Shrikant and Anu Tyagi, demanding that either the damages done to their property be amended and the trees replanted or same rules be applied to the other residents of the society who have encroached common areas. The overnight protest was called off Wednesday evening but later that night the local police booked around 75 people for violating CrPC 144 restrictions imposed in the district.
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