Driven on the backfoot, ADA officials now say they have nothing to do with the FOB and have passed the buck to the Agra Municipal Corporation. The mayor of Agra Anjula Singh Mahaur says the divisional commissioner Radha S Chauhan wanted the project completed before the Commonwealth Games. Radha is the chairperson of the ADA. The Agra municipal corporation commissioner's office says the FOB is not funded by it. A private contractor is doing the job on BOT basis. Funds for it will come from advertising. "Once you have the advertisement banners and hoardings, the process of uglification of the whole area would be complete," comments Rajveer Singh Advocate. Some time ago the district magistrate had declared the whole of MG road as hoardins free zone to prevent accidents. But the licence fees that the local corporation collects from advertising is too much of an incentive to disfigure the "life line of the city."

 The principal FM Prasad and Madhurima Sharma, a teacher say they alongwith students had opposed the project as it blocked the view from the MG Road and the whole ambience was disfigured.

 Both in Delhi and Agra, the ex-students have held a series of meetings and launched a campaign against the FOB to halt it. Rajeev Gupta, secretary says the FOB should have been sited a distance away from its present location to be useful for anybody. "Right now it is an ugly sight and will increase road accidents," he adds.

 St. John's College, a protestant institution has been a pioneering educational college which produced the likes of Dr Shankar Dayal Sharma and numerous politicians and bureaucrats, attracts notice from MG Road for its sheer beauty. Built in red sand stone in composite Mughal and European styles, several films have been shot against its backdrop.

Surendra Sharma, president of the Braj Mandal Heritage Conservation Society says it is a clear case of "visual pollution," and must be halted immediately. "It is high time they had an Urban Arts Panel to advise mandarins in the ADA to design buildings in tune with the essential character of this Mughal metropolis," Sharma adds.

Scores of organisations in the city have voiced their concern and anger against the FOB alongwith a bus stand and a proposed three wheeler stand at the same site, but so far work has not stopped. The mayor told the media "they should have brought their opposition to our notice when the project was sanctioned." To this the opponents say "we never got wind of it and nobody was told what was going on till we saw the structure suddenly coming up." Ravi Singh, an environmentalist, adds "this site is totally unsuitable from any angle. It is going to prove an architectural disaster for the city like so many other ad hoc projects."

The ADA is clearly caught between the horns of a dilemma. Though the project technically speaking is not ADA's, but the permission for all new structures in the city is given by it. "The commissioner heads it, so how can they deny the project doesn't belong to them. More importantly you can not lay a brick in the city without the approval and consent of the ADA. So how come such huge structure is coming up without its support," asks Vishal, an eco-activist.