Dankuni township project plan stopped

Kolkata: In a move that would hurt the business plans of major builders and developers working in the state, the Left Front ruled government of West Bengal today announced that it would not proceed with the proposal to build a 4840 acre satellite township at Dankuni, 20km west of Kolkata on the national highway corridor, because the opposition Trinamul Congress had won most of the seats in the recently concluded three-tier panchayat elections there.

The Dankuni township was halfway to the Tata Motors Rs 1 lakh car plant at Singur, located 40km west of the city on the same highway.

Major developers like DLF had expressed keen interest in participating in the township project.

To execute it, the government in association with the three-tier local self government bodies of zilla parishad (district council), panchayat samity (district association) and gram panchayats (village councils), all so long under Left Front control, had set up a land procurement committee to take over land through negotiations with owners.

After the panchayat elections in May, the opposition had seized seats at all the three tiers.

Local voters felt that the Left Front government move to take over existing homes and residences to make homes for the 'urban rich' was most unjust and therefore voted them out, said one Trinamul Congress source.

A total of 4,840 acre was to be taken over, with 4,069 acre out of that earmarked for residential projects and 750 acre for industrial parks.

The opposition party demanded that all notifications relating to acquisition of the land there issued in the past be scrapped immediately.

The state government had some months ago, by a special notification, frozen all land transactions and restricted land transfers in the locality except to the land procurement committee, Trinamul Congress alleged.

The state government had claimed that the project would create employment opportunity for 4.3 lakh people in justifying these steps.

The state government had originally proposed that the entire land for the project would be procured by the government agency Kolkata Municipal Development Authority (KMDA) directly from farmers with their consent.

State urban development department minister Asok Bhattacharya, announcing the cancellation of the project here, said that villagers were offered prices ranging from Rs 8 lakh to Rs 16 lakh per acre.

In the prevailing situation with change of boards in the panchayat bodies, the government would not like to proceed with the project and decided to shelve it and dissolve the land procurement committee, he added.

Thanks to the Left Front's land reforms programme, the land owners were partially alienated from the land, in the sense that they owned the title but were bound by irrevocable contract with the recorded bargadar (share cropper) and registered landless labourers.

Land acquisition would displace all the three layers of dependents but the land owning class stood to gain the most as it would receive highest compensation under the acquisition process. Dankuni had a large number of small industries and a state government housing board housing complex, as well as a large number of small manufacturing units and service establishments like a Reliance Communications hub and logistics centres.

A large number of land transactions were registered at the land records office there, indicating the location was a very attractive one and there was great demand in the open market for land in the area.