Land owners threaten to halt road work
Source: The Sangai Express

Thoubal, September 03 2022: The National Highway New Alignment Affected Land Owners Committee has demanded equal compen-sation for all lands affected by the Asian Highway development project and also warned of boycotting the ongoing highway work if their demands are not met.

Tekcham Rameshwar, president of the committee, said this during a press meet held at Wangjing and added that affected land owners of Wangjing are being paid lesser amounts of compensation and appealed the Government to address the issue and ensure that compensation is paid uniformly to all the affected landowners.

He added that a recent notification issued the by Thoubal DC on July 16 had reduced the rate for compensation to Rs 537 per sq ft.

As the notification also added that the new rate is inclusive of 100 per cent of solatium amount, the effective rate of the land is just Rs 268.50 per sq ft against Rs 707 per sq ft as per Thoubal DC's order dated December 23, 2019 which also didn't include solatium amount, he added.

Rameshwar further added that the rate of compensation in adjoining areas of Athokpam, Kiyam, Wai-thou, Usoipokpi and Thou- bal are in the range of Rs 1000-1200 per sq ft.

The land owners of Wangjing area have been raising the issue to Thoubal DC from time to time but the same has not been addressed till date.

He also questioned why no arbitrators were appointed to negotiate the rate of compensation in Thoubal district as per provisions of the official guidelines which are followed in other districts.

Differently abled individuals whose 100 percent land holdings have been affected by the project had already submitted relevant documents to the DC's office but no steps have been taken up till date to relocate them, he added.

Rameshwar said the people will stop the highway construction work if the Government does not address their demands at the earliest.

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