There’s always been
talk of the trickle down effect of India’s economic boom. But few would
have reckoned that a trickle gushing into a village near Delhi would have
inundated it with crorepatis — more than a thousand of
them.
Two years ago, Radadhana
in Sonepat district, about 50 km northwest of Delhi was a paddy-growing village
where bullock carts jostled for space on its dusty tracks. The tracks are still
dusty, but now Skodas, Hondas, Endeavours and other SUVs jostle for parking
space on them. The homes made of bricks fired at the local kiln are gone,
replaced with hurriedly made and often garishly painted three-storey mansions
fitted with ACs.
Gone are men
lolling about in kurta-pyjamas in the off-harvest months. Now sharply dressed
people strut around in branded jeans. Seeing the demand jump, store-owners in
Sonepat, about 15 minutes away, have let out space for showrooms to well-known
clothing brands.
What happened
isn’t hard to see, although the magnitude of change is mindboggling.
Farm-dependent families, even with holdings as large as 10 acres, on an average
made a profit of a lakh at the end of each annual paddy season. But then Delhi
property prices soared. The zameen here didn’t yield sona, the land itself
turned to gold, thanks to the Midas touch of
realtors.
When developers first
approached villagers in early 2005, fat offers started at about Rs 20 lakh per
acre. "Money started raining on the village. A person who had never seen a
bundle of Rs 1 lakh, suddenly earned Rs 50 lakh," says Suresh Saroha, a
government official from this village. Then land prices started galloping and an
acre of land went for more than Rs 1.40 crore in Radadhana, which is tucked
barely two km off GT Road.
"The
total land of the village is 2,800 acres of which about 2,000 acres have been
acquired by builders at an average rate of Rs 50 lakh per acre. The village has
a population of 7,000 grouped in about 1,400 families. Barring some 200 families
of backward classes who are landless, every family must have a net worth of over
Rs 1 crore," says sarpanch Manoj Saroha, doing a quick back-of-a-postage stamp
calculation.
What has this
windfall done to villagers? "We are yet to come to terms with the effects of
this deluge of hard cash," says Sanjay, a man in his
mid-thirties.
The villagers get
VIP treatment at stores in the area. "Radadhana has become a brand name.
Wherever we go, we are treated specially. The mere mention of the
village’s name is enough to give a jolt to the attendant," he
says. |
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