Prayagraj Industrial Smart City (IMC Prayagraj): Land Acquisition Status

Acquisition model: no fresh farmland notification for the NICDC parcel

Unlike greenfield industrial corridors that require new Right to Fair Compensation (RFCTLARR) notifications, IMC Prayagraj does not sit on freshly notified farmland. The upcoming Integrated Manufacturing Cluster (IMC) at Saraswati Hi-Tech City, located 25 km south of Prayagraj, spans 352 acres with an investment potential of ₹1,600 crore. The 352-acre parcel is drawn from land that Uttar Pradesh's industrial development authority already assembled years earlier for the broader township.

Saraswati Hi-Tech City spreads over 1,138.78 acres near Naini in Allahabad (Prayagraj) district and is being developed as an Industrial Model Township with non-polluting industrial, residential, commercial, institutional and sports sectors. UPSIDA's own project record for the township states this land has already been acquired: 1138.78 Acres of land have been acquired for this project. Because of this, the NICDC listing describes the IMC component as an Augmentation of Saraswati Hi-Tech city with a Developed land parcel available for EV sector — language consistent with allotment of already-held land rather than a live acquisition award.

Compensation rates

No compensation rate — per-acre, per-hectare, or multiple of circle rate — specific to the 352-acre IMC Prayagraj parcel appears in NICDC, UPSIDA or state government filings reviewed for this page. This is consistent with the parcel being carved from an existing, already-acquired UPSIDA land bank rather than a fresh acquisition round; no current farmer payout figures for this specific project have been published.

This is different from other, unrelated land actions in Prayagraj district run by the Prayagraj Development Authority (PDA) — a separate agency working on urban housing schemes, not the NICDC industrial cluster. For example, on PDA's Jhunsi/Hetapatti residential-commercial scheme, officials have stated Compensation will be set at four times the prevailing circle rate, and though many farmers have indicated willingness to cooperate, some have expressed concerns that authorities intend to address. That rate applies to a different PDA project, not to IMC Prayagraj, and should not be assumed to carry over.

Villages and districts covered

The IMC parcel and its host township are both located at Naini in Prayagraj district. Saraswati Hi-Tech City Project spreads over 1138.78 Acres near Naini in Allahabad district. No published, village-by-village breakdown of the 352-acre NICDC carve-out (naming individual villages or per-village hectarage within Naini/Karchana tehsil) was found in NICDC, UPSIDA or district-level land acquisition proceedings reviewed for this page. The nearest rail reference point for the cluster is the New Karchana EDFC Station (7 km), and the site is proximity to Prayagraj Airport (24 km), placing it in the Naini–Karchana belt south of the city.

District-level land acquisition award notices published by the Prayagraj administration cover a range of villages across tehsils such as Soraon, but these relate to separate acquisition proceedings (for example under earlier Section 23 awards) and are not confirmed to overlap with the Saraswati Hi-Tech City/IMC footprint.

Budget allocated

NICDC's official project page for IMC Prayagraj lists a Project Cost · 658 · crore · Investment Potential · 1,600 · crore · Employment Potential · 17,700 · jobs for the cluster. India's National Investment and Infrastructure Grid (NIIG) listing for the project records a comparable total project cost of roughly USD 82.74 mn, with a tender-publish date of 15-Dec-2025 · 15-Dec-2028 marking the expected execution window. These figures cover infrastructure development on the already-held parcel, not land purchase, since no separate land-acquisition budget line for this component has been published.

Disputes and farmer negotiations

No disputes, protests or farmer-compensation negotiations tied specifically to the 352-acre IMC Prayagraj parcel at Saraswati Hi-Tech City were found in current reporting. This is consistent with the land having been assembled by UPSIDA prior to NICDC's cluster designation, rather than through an active acquisition process that would typically generate such disputes.

Readers should be careful not to confuse this with other, separate land actions in Prayagraj district that are drawing farmer pushback or negotiation — notably PDA's unrelated urban expansion scheme, where officials have initiated acquisition talks with landowners, with more than 500 cultivators likely to be affected, and where while a significant number of cultivators have indicated their willingness to support the initiative, some have raised concerns about the impact of land acquisition. That project (covering Jhunsi and Hetapatti-area villages) and PDA's separate Aero City township near Jhalwa — for which PDA will begin land procurement in the next financial year, with farmland to be purchased from cultivators at an estimated ₹3,300 crore — are run by the Prayagraj Development Authority for housing purposes and are administratively distinct from the NICDC-led industrial cluster covered on this page.

Current stage

As of the most recent NICDC update, IMC Prayagraj is past the land-assembly stage and into infrastructure procurement. The implementing special purpose vehicle, AKIC IMC Agra Prayagraj Limited, headquartered at the UPSIDA Complex 1/4, Lakhanpur, Kanpur-208024, has floated an e-tender for Design, Construction, Testing, Commissioning and Operation & Maintenance of Infrastructure Works for Integrated Manufacturing Cluster (IMC) at Prayagraj under the Amritsar Kolkata Industrial Corridor (AKIC) Project "On EPC Basis". NICDC's own project record for the cluster was Last updated on : 05th Aug 2025, and the national investment grid shows a tender-to-completion window of 15-Dec-2025 · 15-Dec-2028.