10 ft by 10 ft, day by day, a house is on the move in Roshanwala village in Sangrur district of Punjab. Sukhwinder Singh Sukhi and his brother built their dream home over the course of two years, between 2017 and 2019, spending by their estimate around Rs 1.5 crore. Then came the news of the Delhi-Jammu-Katra Expressway project that would pass through the land. Sukhi could have let the house be razed, and built one again. Or, he could have just moved the whole double-storey structure. He chose the latter. The total distance to be moved is 500 ft; they have already covered about 200 ft. Another three months, and Sukhi and his joint family of nine expect to move back into the home that they poured their heart and money into. Sukhi says they scoured the Internet to pick designs, took help from local architects, got extensive woodwork done and customised furniture made, and installed a modular kitchen and sanitary items of the fanciest brands. The decision to move the whole structure was a no-brainer, the farmer in his mid-40s adds. The family had built the house on 1,000 square yards of the 10-odd acres they owned, which contained their fields and a seed factory. Of this, 2.5 acres have now been taken over for the expressway. The seed factory, owned by the family, is already razed and has been set up in a nearby village. It was in December 2020 that the family got to know about the land acquisition for the road project. "We had just done the grah pravesh (house warming). We could not think of demolishing the house and building a new one. We had heard of buildings being moved, so we decided to lift the entire house and place it 500 feet away, within our fields,” Sukhi says. Sukhi says he was lucky to find “technical experts” to help him. Mohd Shahid is from Bakshiwala village within Sangrur district, about 82 km away from Roshanwala. “Work was started in May end. Workers have already shifted the house 200 feet and we will be covering another 300 feet, and further 50 feet more towards one angle,” he adds. Apart from dreams that the house symbolised, moving it was also more economical, Sukhi says. "I built the house for around Rs 1.5 crore three years ago. That is not including the cost of the land on which it stood. We had no energy to spend another two years building a new house. Plus, the cost of construction has doubled, even trebled now. The compensation we got for the land was much less than what we had spent on construction. Hence, lifting the house was the only option,” he says, refusing to divulge how much the family received. Shahid, the contractor, says he has been into “moving of houses for long now”, having handled shops earlier and “two-three houses”, and carried out all projects without any hiccups. However, the challenge this time is the distance Sukhi's house has to be moved. “The maximum shifting I have done till now is 30 feet,” he says, which is why they are going about it slowly and steadily. “Daily, we shift only about 10 feet, no more. At present, I have 20 workers at the site, but on some days, double the workers are deployed. It depends on the stage of the work,” Shahid says. Describing the process, he adds: "First we lifted the beams of the house by 3 feet, and then picked it up by 100 feet from its foundation. Channels and wheels were laid out below and we use jacks to move the house. All the jacks installed across the house are moved together, at the same time. No one can make the slightest error, akh jhapkan jinni galti vi nahin kar sakde (we can’t lose track for even a second). All workers are given a command when they have to move the jack together. Then the house gets elevated and the wheels start moving it." Shahid says they charge for such projects based on the distance they move a structure. “For moving a building 30 feet, charges are Rs 350 per sq feet. For this one, we are charging Rs 1,300 per square feet.” Even if the whole exercise costs him Rs 50-60 lakh, it would be worth it, Sukhi says. “On a new house, we would have spent at least Rs 2 crore or more, and that is if we could use all the material from the existing house. Now, we have just demolished the floor tiles. We will just get flooring done at the new site, after filling the foundation.” Sukhi’s house is not the only one that has faced the hammer due to the expressway project. A crematorium at Roshanwala, a water works building and farm land of other farmers too has been taken over or is facing razing. The village panchayat has been given around Rs 2.5 crore to shift the cremation ground and water works building. Newsletter | Click to get the day's best explainers in your inbox A former sarpanch of Roshanwala, Jagtar Singh, says: “More than 30 acres of land has been taken over in the village. Around 35 houses are affected, with six-seven farmers such as Sukhi hit more. Tubewells of many farmers too now come under the expressway, due to which they couldn't sow paddy this time but shifted to vegetable farming.” Vaneet Kumar, the Sub-Divisional Magistrate of Bhawanigarh, under which Roshanwala falls, said he did not know about Sukhi moving his house. “However, land of many farmers has been taken over for the expressway,” Kumar said. “Land for development of a national highway is acquired under the NH Act 1956. and compensation is determined in accordance with a 2013 Act.” As the work is underway, Sukhi, his elder brother Manjeet Tiwana, and their mother, wives and children, have moved into their old house nearby. Sukhi says this helps him keep an eye on the “very technical work”. “We don't want to get distracted.” Even the fame his house on wheels has started drawing irritates him, he says. "Focus on the work is more important.”
