The Yogi Adityanath-led Uttar Pradesh government’s bulldozer continues to raze illegal structures, including buildings, across the state. On Thursday, illegally constructed houses in Usman Garhi area of Ghaziabad, adjoining national capital Delhi, were destroyed using the machine. The area has houses of Samajwadi Party (SP) leader Usman and his relatives, built on the land of the pond, which were demolished.
The SP leader is accused of having captured 60 bighas of government land three decades back in 1990 and establish Osman Garhi Colony in his name. He gave away few flats to his relatives and sold others to people. Till now, about 400 houses have been built.
Usman is also facing cases of land grabbing, house breaking and dacoity at the Mussoorie police station.
In Uttar Pradesh, Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath has earned the nickname of ‘Bulldozer Baba’ because of his extensive use of the machinery to free up over 67,000 acres of government land from the clutches of land mafia in the state.
It all started during the first tenure of BJP leader Yogi Adityanath as the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh that bulldozers gradually started to be identified as the symbol of state power after the machines were extensively used to raze “illegal” houses and establishments of mafias and criminals.
Also, during the Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections 2022, his rival, Samajwadi Party’s Akhilesh Yadav, used his nickname to attack the chief minister. Yadav had then said, “He (Yogi Adityanath) changed the name of everything. Till now, we were calling him ‘Baba Chief Minister’, but today one English newspaper called him ‘Baba Bulldozer’. I have not kept this name, this name was kept by a reputable English newspaper.”
Unfazed by Yadav’s comments, Yogi then used the bulldozer jibe as a campaigning tool, saying it was a sign of how his government had cracked down on the mafia and was a symbol of development in the state.
