Kerala   

Chengara land agitators on the warpath

Kasaragod: The Chengara land agitators have accused the district administration of adopting a lax attitude towards the problems faced by them.

The agitators, most of them from Pathanamthitta district, said they would resist any attempt to scuttle the rehabilitation package envisaged for them at the Plantation Corporation of Kerala's (PCK) cashew estate at Periye in the district.

A section of PCK officials was trying to scuttle the rehabilitation process using estate workers and trade union leaders, Krishnan Kutty, convener of the Chengara Rehabilitation Committee, alleged at a press conference here on Friday.

The Joint Action Committee of estate workers, led by various trade union leaders, had recently staged a demonstration saying that they would be thrown out of job if the rehabilitation package was implemented at the estate. However, the administration did not send any police force to avert untoward incidents in the locality, Sreeraman Koyyon, coordinating convener of the Adivasi Gothra Jana Sabha said.

The Chengara Rehabilitation Committee, under the aegis of pro-Dalit organisations, will hold a rally and public meeting at Periye on August 25 to highlight their problems.

As many as 15 families had erected temporary shelters at Nalekra Kaliyadukam under the control of the PCK and more people would be settling at the locality after Onam, which would worsen the situation, Mr. Koyyon said. He said while the government had identified 360 families of the Chengara land agitators for rehabilitation in the district, the land at the PCK estate was bereft of any basic provision to set up houses. He said no provision had been made for free supply of ration and no action plan drawn up to develop the laterite soil for cultivation.

The administration had failed to distribute funds to a section of the settlers for facilities like drinking water, forcing the people to depend on wells in private plots.

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Stories in this Section

Chengara land agitators on the warpath
Unique friendship story to be retold on celluloid
Faith offering
Reality meets myth
Calm before a storm

Copyright © 2010, The Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the contents of this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of The Hindu