A municipal plot in Vadodara’s Tandalja area that Yusuf Pathan first asked for in 2012 is now on track to become his, mostly at no cost. On Friday, October 23, the Vadodara Municipal Corporation’s standing committee unanimously approved a proposal to gift the former cricketer 500 square metres of the 978-square-metre plot next to his family home and to let him buy the remaining 478 square metres at a 45% concession, DeshGujarat and India TV reported. The proposal came from the municipal commissioner after the state government gave its approval. It now goes to the VMC general board next month.
Congress leaders and workers protested outside the meeting hall and accused the BJP-run corporation of preferential treatment.
Rs 20.5 crore plot, about Rs 5.5 crore payable
The plot, Final Plot No. 90 in Town Planning Scheme 22, carries a valuation of Rs 2.10 lakh per square metre, which puts the full parcel at about Rs 20.53 crore. The 478-square-metre portion will be priced at 55% of the rate set by the Vadodara Urban Development Authority’s valuation committee.
At the reported valuation, our own arithmetic works out as follows:
- The 500 sq m gift is worth about Rs 10.5 crore.
- The 478 sq m portion is worth about Rs 10 crore at full rate; Pathan would pay roughly Rs 5.5 crore for it.
- Taken together, the corporation would give up close to Rs 15 crore of land value.
Under the state’s resolution, the Revenue Department is to give VMC land of equal value in return for the portion it transfers, so the civic body’s own land bank is meant to be made whole. The loss falls on the state’s side of the ledger.
From a 2014 refusal to a 2026 gift
Pathan asked to buy the plot in 2012. VMC agreed at first, but the state government turned down the sale in 2014, and the land stayed in civic hands on paper.
The dispute revived in 2024, after Pathan won the Baharampur Lok Sabha seat in West Bengal on a Trinamool Congress ticket, when VMC served him a notice to remove the alleged encroachment. He went to the Gujarat High Court, which upheld the state’s 2014 rejection in August 2025. Pathan appealed, then withdrew the appeal in August 2026 and said he would pursue the plot under the state’s land allotment policy instead, PTI reported via The Tribune. The state then cleared a fresh proposal.
The timing has drawn political attention. A few months earlier, Pathan joined a group of Trinamool MPs who broke away from Mamata Banerjee’s party and moved to the NDA side in Parliament.
Questions for the general board
The same state government that refused a paid sale in 2014 has now cleared a part-gift, part-discount transfer of the same land to a sitting MP. Congress protesters asked why one person should get civic land on these terms when ordinary applicants do not.
The general board vote next month is the last civic step. The BJP holds a large majority on the board. Councillors can still ask the commissioner, on the record, which allotment policy covers the gift and what conditions on use or resale come with it.
Sources: DeshGujarat, India TV, The Tribune (PTI)
This report was written with AI assistance from the publicly reported sources linked here; each fact was cross-checked against at least two of them.