BHUBANESWAR: The Ministry of Railways has urged Odisha government to resolve issues related to land acquisition in some of the districts so that construction of tracks and other development activities can be expedited.
Chief Administrative Officer of South Eastern Railway (SER) SM Maheswari has requested Chief Secretary Suresh Chandra Mahapatra to instruct the district officials concerned to assist the Railways in carrying out construction works. He rued that local villagers have again stopped the work in Bondamunda area in Sundargarh district disputing the compensation of the land acquired during 1950 by State government for Railways.
Despite the instruction from the Chief Secretary in a video conference in 2020 to Sundargarh Collector to assist in starting the works and subsequent assurance from the administration during a review by Prime Minister’s Office that the issues will be sorted out by March 2021, the work has not been started.
“The local railway officials have been continuously pursuing the matter with the district authorities but the issues continue to remain unresolved,” he pointed out in a letter to the Chief Secretary.
Land acquisition in Gudgudjore village for Bisra-Link C project and Barabas and Kapatmunda villages for Bondamunda-Hatia project are yet to start though administrative approval for the same have been given since November and December 2021 respectively.Administrative approval is still pending with the State government for acquisition of another patch of one acre of land in Gudgudjore village for the Bisra-Link C project, he stated.
The SER Administrative Officer has also drawn the attention of the government on the removal of encroachments in Rourkela. As many as 801 encroachments are to be removed in Panposh area. Though after initiation, only 80 encroachments have been removed, there is no further progress.
The encroachments have delayed in execution of the third line project in Rourkela-Jharsuguda section.
He has also sought assistance for removal of encroachments at Balasore where the new station building is being constructed on the opposite side of the existing building. Around 238 encroachments need to be removed to facilitate execution of new building and circulating area.
While tenders are yet to be awarded by the State government for execution of seven ROBs in Keonjhar and Sundargarh districts, works need to be expedited for three ROBs in Balasore district. Similarly, the Chief Secretary has been urged to take immediate action on removal of 70 encroachments that are coming in the alignment of Narayangarh-Bhadrak third line project.