Traders, locals protest 'low' compensation for demolition in Ayodhya

The district unit of the BJP and the party's public representatives from Ayodhya are actively engaging with the traders, locals and the local administration to help facilitate the demolition of shops and houses to widen the road along a key stretch in the district which has given rise to a lot of resentment among the trading community.

Demolition of shops and houses on the Ram Path that leads to the under-construction temple, along a route which is lined with shops which have been operating there for decades, has kicked off a row as some traders are protesting about not being given adequate compensation or being given shops away from the prime location that they occupied. With Ayodhya being a crucial constituency for the BJP, the party's local units, as well as the MP and MLA are working alongside the administration to address the woes even as the Samajwadi Party has raked up the issue of traders with chief Akhilesh Yadav expected to visit the holy city on January 27 to take stock of the situation.

Lallu Singh, MP from Ayodhya, told ET that when the valuation of the shops was being done for compensation, he made sure that he sent his workers and local councillors to the teams of administrative officials and got a re-evaluation done.


"We requested that from a humanitarian perspective, the shopowners should be compensated as much as is possible without interfering with the jobs of the officials," Singh said. Singh said those shopowners who had built establishments on PWD land are also being compensated with minimum ₹1 lakh even though as per rules, they should not be.