As our Indica made its way through the streets of Daulatpur, a village in Barabanki district, it kicked up a lot of dust. Not that anyone bothered — there were no excited children running after the car and no one dropped what they were doing to look up. This didn’t strike us as odd till we talked to Ravindra Kumar Singh, the 40-year-old de-facto village head of Daulatpur.

“Chhoti, dehati car dekhne ka kya maza jab hamare yahan bade log sundar aur badi caron mein aate rehte hain (What’s the fun watching small cars when we see famous people in bigger, fancier cars),” boasted Singh.

He was talking about actor Amitabh Bachchan, who recently gave up his land here after he got embroiled in a controversy over owning farmland. About 4.142 hectares were allotted to Bachchan in 1983. He bought the land to establish his credentials as a farmer to buy agricultural land at Pale in Maharashtra. But last week, there were reports that Bachchan gave up the land and donated it to the village panchayat.

“Bachchan returned three pieces of farmland to the gram sabha under pressure from the Mayawati government. But we are happy that he is not leaving the village yet. Last week, his attorney Vinay Kumar Shukla purchased about 10 bighas of freehold land for Bachchan,” Singh, who has sold a plot to Bachchan, said. He said he was planning a visit to Mumbai to request the filmstar to adopt Daulatpur.

... contd.