MADURAI: A public interest litigation petition has been filed in the Madras High Court Bench here to restrain the Union Civil Aviation Ministry, Airports Authority of India (AAI) and the Tiruchi Collector from acquiring agricultural lands in Keelakurichi village for expanding the international airport.
A Division Bench comprising Justice D. Murugesan and Justice S. Nagamuthu on Monday directed the Assistant Solicitor General representing the Centre and the Special Government Pleader representing the Collector to obtain instructions from the officers concerned and adjourned the case to December 14.
Petitioner I. Savarinathan (60), village head man of Nathamadipatti, said that the AAI had originally planned to expand the airport by acquiring large tracts of government lands on the western side of the Tiruchi-Pudukottai road. The lands were found to be suitable as their ground level matched with that of the present airport.
However, “the respondents changed the original plan of extending the airport on the western side at the intervention of politically influential persons with vested interests,” the petitioner alleged and said that they had now decided to acquire vast area of private agricultural lands on the eastern side of the road.
Claiming that the lands, proposed to be acquired, were under green cover and hundreds of farmers were eking out a living by cultivating these lands, the petitioner’s counsel S. Muthukrishnan said that the move was against the Government’s policy of giving priority to agricultural development in the country.
He also stated that expanding the airport on the lands in the eastern side would only lead to additional expenditure as they were situated 20 to 40 feet lower than the ground level of the existing airport.
No comments:
Post a Comment