Delhi-Amritsar-Katra Expressway: Tarn Taran admn hands over land in two villages to NHAI
The administration took possession of 1.3 km land at Fatehabad and 1.2 km at Khuaspur village with the agreement of the concerned owners,” Tarn Taran DC Sandeep Kumar said
District administration on Tuesday secured possession of land at two places — Fatehabad and Khuaspur villages— for the Delhi-Amritsar-Katra Expressway and handed it over to the National Highway Authority of India (NHAI).
The farmers of these villages were resisting the possession of their land and were seeking enhanced compensation. The administration took possession of 1.3 km land at Fatehabad and 1.2 km at Khuaspur village with the agreement of the concerned owners,” Tarn Taran DC Sandeep Kumar said.
After taking possession, the administration handed over the land to the NHAI for initiating work for the expressway. “The landowners fully cooperated in the process of giving possession to the administration”, said Kumar.
Recently, Union road transport and highways minister Nitin Gadkari in a letter to chief minister Bhagwant Mann on August 9 and warned that NHAI will have no other option but to cancel/terminate eight severely affected highway projects in Punjab with a total length of 293 km costing ₹14,288 crore, if the law and order situation does not improve in the state.
Besides highlighting issues of delay in land acquisition, Gadkari’s letter also referred to two incidents in Jalandhar and Ludhiana wherein NHAI staff and contractors working on the Delhi-Katra Expressway were assaulted and threatened.
Replying to Gadkari’s letter, chief minister Bhagwant Mann had blamed the NHAI for the delay in land acquisition and had said that the two incidents of threats and violence in Jalandhar and Ludhiana are attributable to its concessionaire/ contractor.
Mann had also assured the Union minister that Punjab Police was committed to taking care of the safety concerns of NHAI and local police had been directed to deploy patrolling teams in the area to maintain law and order. The CM had also written that the chief secretary was holding regular review meetings with the deputy commissioners and regional office of NHAI to resolve the bottlenecks.