In February 2021, the nephew of the mayor of Ayodhya, Rishikesh Upadhyaya of the Bharatiya Janata Party, bought a plot of land in the town for Rs 20 lakh. Three months later, as I reported with another journalist, the nephew sold the plot to the Ram temple trust for Rs 2.5 crore – 12 times the original price.

Soon, other reports surfaced of similar land transactions in which relatives of politicians and officials had made windfall gains by buying land cheaply and selling it to the temple trust at significantly higher prices, often within days.

The reports prompted the BJP government in Uttar Pradesh to set up a one-man committee headed by the state revenue secretary to investigate the transactions. The committee’s findings are yet to be made public.

But an examination of land records of one village in Ayodhya shows the pattern remains intact – politically-influential people and individuals associated with them continue to buy land cheaply and sell it to the temple trust at higher prices.

All that has changed – perhaps because of the increased scrutiny – is that the transactions have slowed down. Instead of days or months, the gap between the original purchase and the resale has widened to a few years.

The village, Bagh Bijaisi, is about 3 km from the Ram temple. The trust bought land there to establish Teerth Kshetra Puram, a sprawling campus that hosts functionaries of the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, as well as devotees visiting the temple during the festive season.

Among those who have profited from land deals with the temple trust is a leader of the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad, a ward candidate of the Samajwadi Party and associates of the former BJP mayor.

Samajwadi ward leader: 11 times the price

In January 2020, Vishwa Mohini Chaubey bought 621.66 square metres of land in Bagh Bijaisi village for Rs 9 lakh. The price was a fraction of the prevailing circle rate (the minimum price at which a property can be bought and sold), which was Rs 29.8 lakh.

Five years later, in April 2025, she sold the land to the Ram temple trust for Rs 98.2 lakh – nearly 11 times the original price.

Vishwa Mohini Chaubey is the wife of Pradeep Chaubey, who was the Samajwadi Party candidate from Ayodhya’s Devkali ward in the 2023 municipal elections.

In a phone conversation with Scroll, Pradeep Chaubey initially confirmed that he was associated with the Samajwadi Party, but when asked about the land deal in Bagh Bijaisi, he denied any link with the party.

Chaubey said he had bought the land in his wife’s name to pay lower stamp duty. Stamp duty is the tax levied on property transactions. In Uttar Pradesh, women pay lower stamp duty than men.

“I bought the land as an investment in my children’s future,” Chaubey said. “But when the [Ram temple] trust bought all the land surrounding my property, I decided to sell it out of devotion to Shri Ram.”

ABVP leader: Four times the price

In December 2021, Mantosh Maurya bought 277 square metres of land in Ayodhya’s Bagh Bijaisi village for Rs 13.3 lakh.

Four years later, in January 2025, Maurya sold the land to the Ram Mandir trust for Rs 50 lakh – four times the original price.

Maurya is the__ city__ president of the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad in Deoria, a town 180 km east of Ayodhya. The ABVP is the student wing of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, the parent organisation of the BJP.

“I bought the land for my children,” Maurya told Scroll. “The trust was in a land acquisition drive in the area but I did not want to sell my land. After a point, I couldn’t access the property [because of the trust’s acquisition in the area]. I had to sell it to them after a year-and-a-half of struggle.”

Samajwadi leader’s nephew: Three times the price

In December 2021, Shikha Gupta bought 833 square metres of land in the village for Rs 40 lakh. Less than two years later, in November 2023, she sold 763.3 square metres of this land to the Ram temple trust for Rs 1.14 crore – about three times the price she had purchased it for.

Shikha Gupta is the wife of Amit Gupta, the nephew of Nand Kumar Gupta, a state secretary of the Samajwadi Party’s traders’ association in UP.

A phone call to Nand Kumar Gupta was answered by his wife, Aparna, who said that he was not available to comment due to cancer treatment.

Amit Gupta confirmed his relationship with Nand Kumar Gupta and told Scroll: “We had bought the land for residential purposes. When the trust began taking over properties in the village, they made us an offer. We decided to sell it to them.”

Associates of former BJP mayor – more than double the price

In March 2021, Harish and Kusum Pathak gave away 890 square metres of land in Bagh Bijaisi worth Rs 42.7 lakh to Ravindra Dube. Dube did not have to pay to acquire the land because it was a gift deed.

Two-and-a-half years later, in October 2023, Dube sold 510 square metres of this property to the Ram temple trust for Rs 54.9 lakh – more than double the land’s market value of Rs 24.5 lakh.

Dube is the brother-in-law of Ravi Mohan Tiwari who, along with the Pathaks, featured in one of the most controversial Ayodhya land deals reported in 2021. That year in March, the Pathaks had sold a land parcel in Bagh Bijaisi to Tiwari and one Sultan Ansari for Rs 2 crore. Minutes later, Tiwari and Ansari had sold it to the trust for Rs 18.5 crore – more than nine times the price.

Dube first confirmed to Scroll that he is Ravi Mohan Tiwari’s brother-in-law, but denied the relationship after he was asked about the land transactions.

“Yes, I have made money [in the transactions], but what does Ravi Mohan Tiwari have to do with it?” he said. “I am not his brother-in-law.”

Tiwari, on his part, is distantly related to Rishikesh Upadhyaya, the former BJP mayor of Ayodhya. Tiwari’s nephew is married to Upadhyaya’s niece.

Upadhyaya played down his family connection to Tiwari. “If you look that far, then the entire Ayodhya is related to me,” he said.

Scroll’s calls to Tiwari went unanswered. Questions sent to him by SMS did not go through. This report will be updated if he responds.

Tiwari’s associates are connected to another land deal in Bagh Bijaisi village.

On March 8, 2022, a man named Aatmaram sold 122.67 square metres of land in the village to Prabhakar Tiwari for Rs 23.8 lakh. He also sold 155.205 square metres of land to Vishwa Pratap Upadhyaya and Rajendra Prasad Yadav for Rs 7.45 lakh.

In November 2023, Tiwari, Upadhyaya and Yadav sold the combined land to the Ram temple trust for Rs 37.8 lakh.

Vishwa Pratap Upadhyaya is a relative of Ravi Tiwari. He told Scroll that he runs a real-estate business with Rajendra Prasad Yadav. “We sold the land to the trust because they had approached us,” he said.

Rajendra Prasad Yadav said he is Ravi Tiwari’s neighbour and their families know and visit each other. He said he had bought the land with Upadhayay to build a house there. “But we had to sell it because once the [Ram temple] trust began purchasing properties, we couldn’t access our land,” he said.

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