Chandigarh, Feb. 21 -- The Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) on Friday stated that the Haryana Shehri Vikas Pradhikaran (HSVP) used a part of privately owned land for a road project in Gurugram without acquiring it or paying compensation to the land owners. The land owners filed a petition in the Punjab and Haryana High Court in April 2019 which subsequently directed the HSVP to purchase the land under the new land acquisition law for Rs.3.97 crore. "The use of the unacquired land in a road project by HSVP is in violation of the constitutional right of the landowners and provisions of land acquisition laws and its acquisition only after the directions of the high court not only kept the landowners deprived of their land without any compensation but also led to additional financial burden of Rs.3.66 crore on HSVP," stated a compliance audit report of CAG. Haryana's urban estate department issued a notification under Section 4 of Land Acquisition Act, 1894 (LA Act) in January 2008 for acquiring 64.62 acres in Gurugram to develop a 150-metre-wide periphery road, the report said. "Audit of the HSVP zonal administrator, Gurugram revealed (November 2022) that HSVP had used three kanal (0.375 acre) of land in Dhanwapur, Gurugram for construction without acquisition. The landowners in December 2018 requested HSVP for compensation. However, no action was taken by the HSVP," the CAG said. The HSVP administrator in November 2024 stated that some portions of adjoining unacquired land was essential for the project. "The reply is not acceptable... it used the land and purchased it after a delay of 11 years and only after the HC's intervention,'' the audit report said. HSVP officials could not be reached by HT for a comment by the time of going to print. htc...