The breathtaking landgrab in BJP-ruled states

Once home to the 19th century surveyor-general Sir George Everest, George Everest Estate in Mussoorie is a popular tourist attraction. The Uttarakhand Tourism Development Board took a Rs 23.5 crore loan from the Asian Development Bank (ADB) to build exclusive parking facilities, pathways, a helipad, five wooden huts, two museums and an observatory.

This prime property — spread over 142 acres, with an estimated market value of up to Rs 30,000 crore — has now been handed over — on a 15-year lease at an annual fee of Rs 1 crore — to a company in which Patanjali Ayurved Ltd chairman and managing-director Acharya Balkrishna holds a controlling stake.

All three companies that submitted bids to operate the Everest Estate had one common (majority) shareholder: Acharya Balkrishna, Baba Ramdev’s long-time business partner. At the time of bidding in 2022, Balkrishna held a 99 per cent stake in both Prakriti Organics and Bharuwa Agri Science, and a 25 per cent stake in Rajas Aerosports. When Rajas Aerosports was awarded the contract in July 2023, Balkrishna’s shareholding in the company jumped to 63 per cent.

Fishy? It gets worse. The Uttarakhand government has since extended its benevolence by recommending Rajas Aerosports and Adventures for subsidised air safari services and even waived landing charges — raising further questions about cronyism and regulatory favouritism.

The state government swiftly dismissed such allegations, leaning on the ingenious explanation from the Patanjali Group — that an investor’s ‘passive shareholding’ does not amount to ‘active collusion’.

Yashpal Arya, Leader of Opposition in the Uttarakhand Assembly, didn’t mince words, calling it the biggest scandal to hit the 25-year-old state. “After spending Rs 23 crore from an ADB loan to beautify the land,” he said, “the government handed it over to a private company for 15 years — for a mere Rs 15 crore in lease rent over the entire period.” His outrage underscores what many see as a glaring case of public assets being quietly funnelled into private hands, under the guise of development.

The Patanjali Group has leapt from ayurveda to FMCG (fast-moving consumer goods) to tourism at a breathtaking pace. A principal figure behind the ‘India Against Corruption’ campaign and Narendra Modi’s bid to become prime minister, Baba Ramdev and his Patanjali Group benefitted enormously as one BJP-ruled state after another facilitated land transfers for cow shelters, ayurveda, wellness and yoga centres.

While Baba Ramdev remains the public face of the group, it is Acharya Balkrishna who conducts the business end of what has become India’s fastest growing Rs 6,199-crore consumer goods company.

The windfall for the Group began months after Narendra Modi took over as prime minister in May 2014. In October 2014, Ramdev was given 1,200 acres of undeveloped land in Assam free of cost for the ‘preservation and promotion of cow breeds’. In Himachal Pradesh, the BJP government handed over 30 acres in Solan district on a 33-year lease for a token payment of — hold your breath — one rupee.

In Kangra and Hamirpur, land was granted for a rural self-employment training institute, an initiative of the ministry of rural development. In Kandaghat, 96 bighas were given on a 99-year lease to develop a herbal resource centre. Public outcry led to this lease being cancelled in 2013 only to be renewed in 2017. Twelve years later, the land remains unutilised.

In 2016, Baba Ramdev was granted a staggering 88 per cent discount on a 40 acre plot in Madhya Pradesh’s Dhar district to establish a food processing unit. That same year, the Maharashtra government allotted him 600 acres in Nagpur — intended for a food processing unit, an orange processing facility, an Ayurvedic centre, and even a multi-modal international hub airport — at a heavily subsidised 75 per cent concession.

Political patronage was on full display at the stone-laying ceremony in Nagpur, which was attended by a galaxy of BJP leaders. The story goes that Acharya Balkrishna turned to Union minister Nitin Gadkari and said, “We want a road.” Gadkari reportedly replied that he had already decided to build a national highway through the area. The then (and as it happens current) chief minister of Maharashtra, Devendra Fadnavis, justified the sweetheart land deal by claiming the land was “undeveloped”.

The Patanjali Group’s ravenous appetite for land has led to increasingly aggressive tactics — including arm-twisting Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath, who sees Ramdev as a competitor, into allocating a 300-acre plot at 25 per cent below market rate.

In Rajasthan’s Karauli district, the group is setting up a yoga centre-cum-food park on land locally known as ‘mandir maafi’. Initiated by erstwhile maharajas, it refers to land that cannot be sold or leased, being designated only for temples. The Hindu Right — usually so vocal on religious matters — has remained deafeningly silent on this one.

As part of a major push for land reforms in UP five decades ago, every Dalit family in Teliwala village (district Haridwar) was allocated six bighas of farm plots that could not be sold, and if leased, only to other Dalits. The Patanjali Group got around the restriction and took over 600 bighas through ‘donation’ deeds between 2005 and 2010. This land is now dedicated to medicinal herbs, sugarcane and cow shelters. Patanjali profited, and Dalit families were left landless.

In Mangar — a forested village in Haryana’s ecologically sensitive Aravalli region — the Group has acquired over 400 acres. These transactions, which took place between 2014 and 2016, involved land classified as ‘shamlat deh’ or common village land, legally intended for community use. The acquisition trail raises red flags.

A network of shell companies — most reporting zero revenue — initially signed power of attorney agreements with the original landholders, many of whom held disputed claims. Once the land changed hands, Acharya Balkrishna emerged as the majority stakeholder in these companies.

In fact, the BJP government in Haryana has gone out of its way to facilitate Patanjali’s land grab. The Haryana Assembly amended the Punjab Land Preservation Act, 1990, effectively opening up thousands of acres in the Aravalli hills for real estate development and mining. The Supreme Court sharply rebuked the state government for destroying the ‘lungs of Delhi’ and halted any further action under the amended Act.

Despite Supreme Court directives from 1996, the Draft Regional Plan 2041 for the National Capital Region (NCR) has excluded the Aravalli hills, major river tributaries — including those of the Yamuna, Ganga, Kali, Hindon and Sahibi — as well as critical ecological zones such as animal sanctuaries and key water bodies like Badkhal Lake, Surajkund, Damdama Lake (all in Haryana), and Siliserh Lake in Rajasthan, from legal protection.

The draft plan has also removed the cap on construction in these environmentally sensitive zones. Under the existing 2021 plan, construction was strictly limited to 0.5 per cent of the land in these areas — a restriction that has now been quietly removed.

What this means is that powerful real estate moguls like Ramdev’s Patanjali Group — who have allegedly acquired panchayati land, ‘gair mumkin pahar’ (uncultivable wasteland) and forest land at throwaway prices — can now develop these properties for commercial and residential purposes. This, despite the subsequent Supreme Court order of 7 April 2022 that all panchayati land should be restored to the panchayats.

Gurugram-based analyst Chetan Agarwal points out, “The real estate lobby operating in the NCR has built land banks on which they could not build earlier because of the ‘0.5 per cent of land’ restriction on construction in natural conservation zones. The removal of this cap has unleashed a building spree, especially since the Regional Plan 2041 has shrunk the Natural Conservation Zone and diluted zoning regulations.”

The Baba’s latest ambition is to set up a milk processing unit, a food park and a herbal medicinal unit in Gadchiroli, Maharashtra. He is also eyeing 600 acres in Vidarbha where farmers continue to lurch from one big agrarian crisis to another.