The Jats Who Owned Lutyens' Delhi And A 104 Year Old Wait For Compensation

Great cities often come up at the expense of smaller hamlets. And New Delhi is certainly not among the exceptions of this gospel. When the British decided to shift their capital to Delhi from their de-facto base and centre Calcutta in 1912, nearly 150 villages in Delhi, mostly inhabited by farmers had to forsake their land holdings.

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But while many villages got away with just surrendering their lands, the villages falling in central, what would later come to be called Lutyens¡¯ Delhi, had to bear more as the British not only took their lands (with or without their consent) but also uprooted them from their homes.

One such village was Malcha (Yes, the Malcha Mahal fame) village, whose erstwhile residents have been fighting the case in Delhi High Court since 2012 demanding for compensation because they claim that they hadn¡¯t accepted the compensation given by the British.

Malcha was mostly inhabited by the Jat farmers who now live in a village near Sonepat in Haryana called Harsana Malcha.

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IndiaTimes went to Harsana Malcha to find out the exact story behind their exodus and why have they come back to stack claim on lands that earmark India¡¯s seat of democracy and hallowed home of its President.

The background

¡°It was the month of December 1912, when our forefather had to leave the land, they had been tilting and living in for centuries. Malcha had a whopping 1792 acres of land on which 1/3 of the President Estate and all other major buildings of South-West Lutyens Delhi are situated. Malcha had a total of 107 households, mostly farmers apart from the Muslim colony of Talkatora (erstwhile Thalkatora) which was a subsidiary of Malcha village."

"The British uprooted us without giving any compensation because whatever they offered was nothing in bone-chilling winters of December 1912,¡± said Krishan Kumar (63), who served last days of his defence ministry job in South Block, the lands that his forefathers once used to tilt.

Apart from Malcha, the British acquired roughly 2000 acres in Raisina village again inhabited by the Jat farmers.

The British had acquired land in over 150 villages in Delhi, but they removed seven 20 odd big and small hamlets that were located in present day Lutyens Delhi. Raisina, Malcha, Kushak, Pelanjee, Dasgarah, Talkatora and Motibagh are main villages which were completely uprooted from their original location. And that¡¯s the reason that despite rest of Delhi has buildings made by the British as well as the villages which have now become highly urban except for the Lutyens Zone, where all settlements were removed.

Out of 107, nearly 42 households settled in Harsana Malcha

After they were uprooted, the various households struggled for the roof over their head, forget the bread and butter. Krishan Kumar recalls that his grandfather who was born after settling in Harsana used to tell him that 42 households settled in Harsana and nobody knows about others.

Krishan Kumar, IndiaTimes

¡°This village's name is Harsana Kalan, but in order to protect our identity as the real residents of New Delhi, we have added Malcha to its name. We love to get identified as the residents of Harsana as we have spent over four generations here, but Malcha is an inherent part of our lives,¡± added another Krishan Kumar (cousin brother of the first one) who tilts lands in Harsana whose great grandfather, as he claimed (for which he produced papers later) was the Numberdar (designation given by the British which means the biggest landlord) of Malcha with a whopping 250 acres of land.

Here is the compensation that the British offered

Senior Krishan Kumar is someone who can speak clean if not fluent English and he¡¯s the one who has been fighting their cause whether it¡¯s filing RTIs to seek information or attending the hearings in Delhi HC.

IndiaTimes (First paper show the document of lands acquired for Thalkatora and Malcha. Second document shows the thumb impression of farmers who accepted the compensation plus those who didn't)

¡°For our households, the British had given Rs 5 per household as disturbance allowance, and for agricultural land they offered on Rs 3 per bigha (Rs 15 per acre since an acre has five bighas) for non-irrigated and Rs 4 per bigha for irrigated land (Rs 20 per acre) which was just a joke with us.¡±

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¡°You would think that I am joking because Rs 15 or Rs 20 in those days was not a small money. But let me tell that my forefathers who were Numberdars had collected enough money after years of tilting, had bought land in Harsana in 1913 at Rs 33 per bigha which comes around Rs 165 per acre, roughly ten times the amount offered by the British. I need not say anything about the difference between the location of the two places,¡± laughs senior Kumar.

Smaller farmers accepted compensations, but bigger didn¡¯t

Kumar tells those smaller farmers, mainly Muslims, Sainis, Brahmans and some Jats accepted the money offered, but the Jats who had bigger land holdings didn¡¯t accept the money and refused to surrender their household and lands.

Then came the canons

Kumar and others present in the room narrated that following Malcha¡¯s resistance many nearby villages like Raisina, Kushak and other villages defied the British orders of vacating the villages. The British knew if Malcha which was the biggest among the villages accepts it, all other will too do so. Therefore, the brought up canons and gave villagers time of 48 hours to vacate the village. Rest is history and all had to flee. Those who hadn¡¯t taken compensation didn¡¯t accept it even then.

But non-acceptance of compensation became bedrock of their case

Kumar senior who had seen during his job had seen how the system functions had been trying to elevate this matter since 2000. ¡°I filled an application with Land Acquisition Collector (LAC) in 2000 about the status of the compensation for my great grandfather¡¯s 240 acres of land. I didn¡¯t get any answer till 2006,¡± added Kumar.

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But first RTI and then UPA¡¯s Land Bill helped their cause

With the arrival of RTI in 2005, Kumar¡¯s quest for answers was nudged. He filed one RTI after another to find out the status of the compensation that his forefather didn¡¯t take any compensation from the British.

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¡°After a lot of efforts, I came to know that since we hadn¡¯t accepted the compensation, the British had submitted that money with Divisional Judge of that particular area. I filled another RTI to seek the records personally but failed since we couldn¡¯t obtain the record of the compensation from the revenue records. But we managed to get the papers of non-acceptance of the compensation which led us to fill a case in 2007-08 in Patiala House court. But the court dismissed the case in 2012."

UPA¡¯s land bill came as a breather

Kumar tells that when the UPA government came out with Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013 (LARRA) which said that if that a piece of land will be re-acquired in two conditions. One is if farmers doesn¡¯t accept the compensation and land lie unused for five years and second, if despite the farmer accepting money, the land lies unused for five years (These are personal remarks of Kumar and IndiaTimes don¡¯t attest to the authenticity of the provisions of LARRA told by Kumar).

PTI

¡°Citing another opportunity to claim what rightfully was ours, we filled another case in 2013 in Delhi High Court for which hearings are going on,¡± added Kumar.

We demand the right compensation

¡°It¡¯s evident that our forefathers hadn¡¯t taken the compensation and our land was taken against our wishes. Therefore, our request from the court is to compensate us with money as per today¡¯s price,¡± signed off Kumar.

Well, the matter is before the court and it will decide whether these people will get their due or not, but now it's evident that these people were the original residents of the Lutyens' Delhi, the seat of world's largest democracy.