BMIC Viruddha Janandolana, a forum protesting against the alleged irregularities in the implementation of the Bangalore Mysore Infrastructure Corridor (BMIC) project being executed by the Nandi Infrastructure Corridor Enterprise (NICE), has organised a public meeting at Freedom Park on Thursday.
Civic society leaders, including Medha Patkar of the National Alliance of People’s Movement, will address the gathering.
Addressing a press conference, the members of the forum demanded that the State government should intervene immediately to identify the exact extent of land needed for the project and withdraw cases filed against people taking part in the protest.
“More than 5,000 acres of government land, lakes and sacred groves have been taken over for the project. There needs to be immediate action from the government to save these precious natural resources,” said Vinay Sreenivasa of the forum.
The meeting will also look at addressing instances where landowners have been prevented from cultivating their lands. The members also spoke about the physical attacks on people who wanted to protest against the project.
“We also want to ask the government why the job of building a peripheral ring road was not given to the BDA. The city has a right for a toll free peripheral ring road,” Vinay said adding that the expressway project to Mysore has remained just on paper and real estate development by NICE is the reality on the ground.