Kerala - Thiruvananthapuram   

Land acquisition remains obstacle to road project

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: More than five years after the process was initiated, land acquisition continues to worry officials of the City Roads Improvement Project (CRIP).

For over a year now, the total land acquired so far for the 42-km project is stuck at the 90 per cent figure. Apart from the delay caused by court cases in acquiring certain pockets of land, the tug of war between the Kerala Road Fund Board and certain religious institutions is hampering land acquisition.

Project officials say that some religious institutions are causing impediments to the project by deviating from earlier compensation settlements and making fresh demands for acquiring land from their property that has been notified for acquisition under the project.

According to the officials, the St. Thomas Mar Thoma Church at Pattoor has deviated from its original demand for 16.37 cents of land and an amount of Rs.11.48 lakh to relocate the burial tombs in return for around 12 cents acquired from the church cemetery. The church is now demanding additional amount from the government to construct burial vaults other than individual tombs in the compensation land.

“The government had originally agreed to sanction 16 cents as compensation for 12 cents in order to provide them ample space to relocate the tombs. But in a recent meeting with the Works Minister the church representatives said that they will require additional amount as they will be relocating some individual tombs to burial vaults,” a top official said.

However, the Mar Thoma Church has categorically denied the allegations made by project officials. Representatives of the church say that the church has only asked for an amount in tune with the current schedule rates to relocate the tombs.

“The discussions for acquiring land from this cemetery began 10 years back in 1999. Since then the work amount required to relocate the tombs has sharply escalated. All we are asking the government is to either take up the work of relocating the 161 tombs as per the present schedule rates or give us our estimate of around Rs.30 lakh to do that work,” a representative of the church said.

He said the total area of the cemetery is only around 16 cents from which we are giving away more than 70 per cent land. It is the Road Fund Board which is backtracking from the original compensation settlement. “According to the original settlement, it was agreed that the government would level the substitute land handed over to us, which is at a 30 metre elevation from the present cemetery. But now the Road Fund Board says that they cannot do the works,” he said.

Meanwhile, the government has also agreed to sanction Rs.40 lakh to the Latin Catholic Church, whose cemetery lies next to the Mar Thoma Church, for constructing burial vaults to relocate their tombs to the compensation land. The government is providing around 26 cents for the Latin Catholic Church as compensation for around 22 cents to be acquired from their cemetery at Pattoor.

The compensation land for both the churches will be provided from the property of the Health Department lying close to the two cemeteries.

Apart from the churches at Pattoor, the compensation demand made by the Travancore Devaswom Board in return for pockets of land to be acquired from its temples is causing headaches to project officials. The Board has demanded compensation amount for around 10 cents of land to be acquired from three of its temples near the Ayurveda College, General Hospital Junction and Sankhumukham. However, project officials say that it is not possible to sanction the amount as all these pockets of land are shown as ‘puramboke’ land in revenue records.

“Puramboke land is technically government land. So the government cannot sanction money to acquire its own land,” an official said.

Meanwhile, Public Works Department Principal Secretary Tom Jose said that religious institutions were making unreasonable demands.

These demands, he said, were creating impediments to the project. “We actually find it easier to deal with common people when it comes to land acquisition,” he said.

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