Click to play videoPune: Ten years back, Banduram Akhade owned 6 acres of ancestral farmland in Maval taluka of Pune, Maharashtra. But local authorities reserved his land for the construction of a dam.
Today, the same land belongs to Bollywood megastar Amitabh Bachchan. Akhade says he has lost his property papers, but will still fight back.
"Maine socha tha ki main apni zameen par ghar banayega, baju main ghar rahega, kheti rahega, bahut sunder se rahega, yeh log ne mere ghar par dadagiri kar ke khud apna bangla banana shuru kiya (I thought I'd build a house on this land, and do my farming side by side. But these people snatched my land and began constructing a bungalow)," says Banduram Akhade, a farmer at Maharashtra's Maval area.
"Main ro-ro ke zameen main mar jayega, lekin choodega nahin, (I will die on my land, but I won't let it go)," Akhade vows.
The farmers in villages around Maval in Pune have been venting their fury over a land tangle involving Bollywood superstars Amitabh Bachchan and Aamir Khan and several other celebrities who, according to them, own land meant only for farmers.
Like Akhade, 1,200 other farmers had given away their land in 1976 for the construction of the dam. As many as 850 of them are yet to be rehabilitated. Local activists says a total of 3,500 acres of land reserved for the dam was neither used nor returned to their owners.
The sons of the soil have since not got the opportunity to plough the farmland that once belonged to their fathers. What they have inherited is a battle. A battle to not just win back their farmlands, but also get the much-deserved justice no matter what it takes.
"Sangeeta Bijlani ko zameen mil rahi hain, Amitabh Bachchan ko mil rahi hain, Dharmendra ko zameen mil rahee hain... lekin 800 kisano ko dene ke liye zameen nahin hain... Hum iske liye lad rahen hain (People like Sangeeta Bijlani, Amitabh Bachchan and Dharmendra are getting land allotments. But there is no land to rehabilitated these displaced people. This is what we are fighting against)," Raja Ram Sabde, a social activist at Kastachi Bakhar, declares.
Maharashtra Revenue Minister Narayan Rane's recent order to investigate several property deals involving Bollywood starts has come as a breather for these people. But the question still remains unanswered as to why did it take so long for the government to react? After all, farmers in this region have been protesting for the last three decades.
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