Belthangady : Villagers gherao land acquisition officer of HPCL gas pipeline project

Belthangady : Villagers gherao land acquisition officer of HPCL gas pipeline project

Mangalore Today News Network

Belthangady, July 20, 2013 : State Government’s   Land Acquisition Officer Nagaraj was gheraoed by villagers when he had been to  Neriya and Puduvettu on July 19, Friday   to identify land required for a pump house at Neriya to facilitate the HPCL gas pipeline project.

The villagers who feared that the  officer had come to acquire  land for the project, gheraoed him and placed him under detention for almost five hours  after adopting an adamant stand that the DC himself should arrive to solve their problems. 

The Government had in the year 2012 notified 7.10 acre land  in the village for the pump house.

The villagers who came to know about it in the final stage, had filed their objection. A total of six families are residing in the 7.1 acre land and the families had been invited to the taluk office on June 25. Revenue department sources said if three of the families which reported at the taluk office had agreed to let their land, the rest  three had  abstained. In reality, the Land Acquisition Officer had visited the village to  speak to the families which had abstained from  the meeting at the taluk office. But without even informing the tahsildar he had taken along  him the surveyor and village accountant, giving room for suspicion.

This led to tension and finally HPCL Officer Basavaraj Pathoti  gave in writing to the Panchayat President that there would be  no survey work until the problems of the people was solved and an amicable solution reached upon.

The grouse of the villagers is that already diesel was leaking from the existing pipeline and no officer had responded to the problem. They also questioned who would be responsible in case of an eventuality.

Tahsildar Srinivas has informed that the problems would be solved  after convening a meeting of farmers and officials in the first week of August.

Puduvettu GP Chief Gafur, former TP member Sukumar Merla, Circle Inspector Bhasker Rai, Revenue Inspector Mohammad  Babu Gowda, ASI of Belthangady and  Venoor SI Abdul Khader were also present.