Kochi: The Kerala High Court on Wednesday spoke tough on the state government’s K-Rail project and made it clear that the court ‘should not be kept in the dark’ about the details of the project, and directed the authorities to stop laying the stones.
Justice Devan Ramachandran made this remark while hearing a bunch of petitions about the land being taken over for the project.
The court made it amply clear that the present exercise of laying stones in the name of K-Rail was against the rules of Survey and Boundaries Act and asked the authorities that ‘they cannot lay stones embossed with K-Rail on it to demarcate the alignment of K-Rail’.
The court was told that by now over 2,800 such stones have been laid and in all there are close to 13,000 stones that will be laid.
But the court made it clear that this was against the rules and asked the state government to reply to this violation and posted the case for January 20.
The court then asked the Assistant Solicitor General of India to appear in person and give the response to this project by the Centre.
It also pointed out that it’s the same counsel which is appearing for the Centre and also the Indian Railways.
The court also had a piece of advice and pointed out that such mega projects cannot be taken forward by putting people in jeopardy.
Apparently this fresh development came hours after the article of Vijayan appeared in the CPI-M party’s magazine wherein he says that the project has the concurrence of the Centre. He also points out in the article that by now Kerala has by and large accepted this project barring a few stray opposition.
He also goes on to point out that funds (around Rs 33,000 crore) for the major project will be available and that major international funding agencies, including Asian Development Bank have expressed their willingness to fund the project.
Leader of Opposition V.D.Satheesan said they were not aware about this project getting the sanctions. “Merely writing in a party magazine makes no sense. The Assembly has no clue of this project,” said Satheesan.
State BJP president K.Surendran said this project has got no sanction and if anyone comes to take away the land of the ordinary people, ‘it will have to be done after trampling over their bodies’.
In a related development an advertisement appeared in the newspapers on Wednesday which has invited an e-tender to print five million copies of handbook pertaining to K-Rail and meant to be distributed in the state.
(IANS)
