LIFE GOES ON: Squatters along the railway tracks at Rabindra Sarobar breathed easy on Thursday, after the aborted eviction drive on Wednesday. Picture by Pradip Sanyal

A ?lack of political will? led to the failure to evict squatters from the Dhakuria Lakes, alleged mayor Subrata Mukherjee on Thursday.

?The government and railways failed to carry out the drive on Wednesday because they underestimated the strength of squatters? resistance,? asserted Mukherjee.

Over 1,800 police personnel had been deployed to evict nearly 25,000 illegal settlers from railway land at Rabindra Sarobar.

They abandoned the drive within three hours, faced with threat of bloodshed from dwellers, led by local Trinamul Congress MLA Sougata Roy. Party chief Mamata Banerjee had also been camping by the tracks all night.

?The squatters will remain where they are till alternative arrangements are made for them,? said Mukherjee, after a meeting at Writers? Buildings.

The drive also flopped, felt the mayor, as the people had prior notice. ?It is like leaking a question paper before the exams,? he said.

The government was acting on a Calcutta High Court order that set March 2 as a deadline for eviction.

Chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee had on Wednesday blamed the railways for the shanty-dwellers? plight, saying it had done nothing despite many reminders.

?The government cannot act inhumanly even if the railways is shirking responsibility. I have spoken to Union minister Pranab Mukherjee and asked him to take up the matter with the railway minister,? Bhattacharjee had said on Wednesday.

The onus lies with the railways, agreed state urban development minister Asok Bhattacharya.

?The railways spent Rs 500 crores in Mumbai to rehabilitate encroachers,? he pointed out. ?If the railways need help, the state government is willing to pitch in.?

However, the mayor pushed the point that the state government hadn?t pursued the rehabilitation matter seriously with the railway ministry.

?The chief minister should go to Delhi and show the minister areas where land is available for resettlement. If the government takes the initiative in this direction, I will contribute Rs 1 crore from the Calcutta Municipal Corporation,? Mukherjee added. Areas like Brace Bridge, he pointed out, could be used for relocation.

The government is to submit a report to the high court explaining why the drive was aborted.

Meanwhile, inhabitants of the shanties breathed a sigh of relief for the first time in days, as the threat of losing their homes finally diminished. ?The shanty-dwellers, especially the 81 Madhyamik candidates, are very relieved. We have also made arrangements to drop them at their examination centres,? said local councillor Ratan Dey.

The mayor, however, said rehabilitation of evicted people was neither possible nor logical in all cases, as with the Tolly?s Nullah and Beleghata Canal squatters.