The Plunder of Land - Implosion: India's Tryst with Reality - page 115

structure project or because of a change in land use from agricultural to industrial or resid-
ential. Projects are sometimes intentionally delayed while politicians make profits by float-
ing rumours about one site after another. While it is illegal to profit from insider trading in
the stock markets, there is no law against profiting from insider trading in real estate!
Social Wasteland
Such upheaval and dislocation creates a social wasteland of urban sprawl, removing the
stability of old rural communities and identities and providing instant wealth for those who
sell their land well. 'When you can suddenly sell what you have for a crore an acre, the
meaning of land changes,' says Ravinder Kaur, citing 2012 prices on a highway north of
Delhi, in the state of Punjab. 'The sense of belonging somewhere goes, and people lose
their roots.' 10 That leads, she explains, to conflicting reactions of brash arrogance among
the suddenly rich and anxiety among those who have not been so lucky.
People rarely know or seem to care about wise investing. All over India there are stories
of money lost through extortion, squandered on quick purchases and later consumed in al-
coholic despair. The Tehelka article told how One farmer sold his land for Rs 50 lakh and
revelled in wealth he could never have dreamed of a few years earlier. He bought a small
but smart Alto car, two motorbikes, a 12-room house, and married off his daughter. 'I am
totally broke now. There is not a single paisa left. I was greedy for money at that time,'
he said. 'Our situation was better when we were farmers. Nowadays, all we think about is
survival.' 11
The result of this social churn is a confusing melee of ambitions and frustrations with
people falling back on violence as a way of expressing either their new sense of power and
self-importance or the disenchantment of being left behind. This is especially evident in
Haryana and UP where some areas, especially those on the outskirts of Delhi, have always
been regarded as a gangland haven of lawlessness. It is here that labour unrest has broken
out in new auto industry factories and it is also here that crude displays of new power have
occurred.
Sons of regional politicians and others, suddenly rich with wealth from land deals and
corruption, have typically shown scant respect for the law. In September 2011, a 22-year-
old toll booth operator was shot dead on the Gurgaon highway by the driver of a sport
utility vehicle (SUV) - regarded by India's new rich as a symbol of wealth - who refused
to pay the toll of Rs 27. People from nearby villages were exempt from paying tolls if
they could prove their identity, and an argument with the booth operator led to the shoot-
ing that was caught on closed circuit television. 12 In an earlier example of the arrogance of
the newly affluent, a politically connected youth, the son of a Congress MP from Haryana,