Singur, Sept. 26: Mamata Banerjee is going to Katwa next to stall land acquisition for a power plant, already uncertain because of protests.

“A Save Farmland Committee team will visit Katwa to enquire from farmers whether the government is forcibly acquiring their land. We shall soon launch a movement there on the lines of Singur,” the Trinamul Congress leader said at a rally opposite the now-shut Nano plant.

The rally was organised at Gopalnagar-Sanapara to commemorate the alleged killing of a Trinamul youth activist in 2006. Mamata marched around 4km before addressing the rally, which clogged Durgapur Expressway for over three hours from 3pm.

In Katwa, 1,033 acres belonging to 4,600 farmers are required for the project. Of the 403 farmers whose land was to be taken in the first phase, only 55 gave their consent.

Trinamul MLA Saugata Ray, Save Farmland Committee convener and Naxalite leader Purnendu Bose and party councillor Sovan Chatterjee will go to Katwa, about 130km from Calcutta, tomorrow.

“Mamata will go there after we get back to her with an update. We shall talk to the farmers who are unwilling to give their land,” said Bose.

A Trinamul leader said Mamata would spread her agitation against “land acquisi- tion” to keep the issue alive in the run-up to the Lok Sabha elections. “It would also be our main poll plank for the Assembly bypolls at Sujapur in Malda, Para in Purulia and Nandigram in East Midnapore.”

Mamata said she would also go to Noida, where farmers had been agitating against “forcible acquisition of land”.

Samajwadi Party leader Amar Singh has apparently promised 50 MPs to the Trinamul team that would meet the Prime Minister and the President demanding their intervention to stop land acquisition for industry.

The siege that stalled work on the Nano project and blocked the expressway will be “relaunched” after the pujas if the government does not give 300 acres from the plant to the farmers, Mamata said. “We had suspended our siege only after the government agreed in writing to arrange for land-based rehabilitation from within the project area. The chief minister is now dishonouring that agreement.”

Trinamul councillors will also gherao Calcutta mayor Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharyya tomorrow to protest the municipal corporation’s failure to cope with dengue and malaria, which have killed three.

Assault arrest

A known thief, Tajuddin Ahmed Mollah, 35, has been arrested for assaulting two Tata guards on Monday night. He has been charged with attempted murder. CPM supporters said he was a Trinamul man.