Mamata on Sunday

Calcutta, June 13: Railway minister Mamata Banerjee today promised “a one-room flat with a kitchen and bathroom” to all illegal settlers along railway tracks across the country.

The scheme, to be launched in collaboration with the Union urban development ministry, was announced in the presence of Saugata Roy, the junior urban development minister from her party.

“The encroachers will get one-room flats with a kitchen and bathroom. The railways will provide the land for the buildings and the divisional railway managers will be told to identify the land,” the railway minister said while flagging off a clutch of local trains at Sealdah station.

“The urban development ministry has several social welfare housing schemes and this will be under one of them,” she said to applause.

However, launching the rehabilitation scheme, called Sukhi Griha (happy home), may be easier than convincing the settlers to move out.

Railway officials said they had no estimate of how many such families there might be across India. The number may be huge given that according to unofficial railway estimates, there are over 7,000 squatter families in Calcutta and its suburbs.

Attempts to shift these settlers, by force, have been futile. But Mamata believes a sweetened deal — pucca accommodation with property rights — would help her win them over.

It is to be seen whether those staying off tracks in areas like Lake Gardens or Ballygunge agree to shift to places that need not be as well connected. “The land where they will be rehabilitated may not be near the area where they have stayed for years. But then they will have their own home free of cost,” Mamata said.

Earlier, when the Bengal government had built markets to relocate hawkers, many of them had taken up a permanent stall and also retained the one on the roadside. Singur farmers who had lost their land to the Nano project had with Mamata’s support refused to accept land elsewhere.

Railway officials said the scheme was in a nascent stage and not even basic details like the number of beneficiaries and the estimated cost had been worked out.

Mamata said: “We will start a pilot project soon.”

Maoist bashing: At the programme, Mamata slammed Maoists for attacking trains. “It is not right…. If they don’t like me, let them criticise me politically,” she said.