File picture of police keeping vigil in the Posco area during land acquisition

Cuttack/Paradip, June 2: People opposing the 12-million-tonne Posco project seem to be in no mood to give in easily. Today, activists of Posco Pratirodh Sangram Samiti (PPSS) formed a human barricade along the border of Dhinkia gram panchayat, the nerve centre of the movement, against the project.

“We have begun a round-the-clock vigil at Govindapur. People have vowed to guard their villages and stop the land acquisition personnel from venturing into their area. Any bid to forcefully acquire land in Dhinkia GP would be resisted,” said Abhaya Sahu, the PPSS chief.

“People will take turns to guard the villages. The state government in an affidavit has informed the Orissa High Court that acquisition is taking place with the consent of land-losers but the ground reality is different. Of the over 400 betel vineyards that have been demolished so far, a sizeable number were brought down by force,” said Sisir Mohapatra, former Sarpanch, Dhinkia GP and secretary of PPSS.

Meanwhile, six villagers of Govindpur-Dhinkia-Nuagaon area have in an affidavit filed in the high court alleged that “villages in the Posco project area are under siege” and “about 20 platoons of armed policemen are compelling and forcing people to vacate their lands”.

Debendra Swain of Dhinkia filed the affidavit along with five others — Nityananda Behera (Nuagaon), Nishakar Khatua, Baragi Charan Nayak, Pramod Kumar Bardan and Tushar Kanti Dalai (all four of Govindpur).

While filing the additional affidavit the six villagers sought high court intervention to “prevent loss of their property and livelihood, which is in the process of being violated and taken away by force by the state and IDCO”. The vacation court had directed the six villagers to submit their land ownership details in the form of Record of Rights (RORs) and fixed June 3 for hearing the case.

On ground zero, however, the land acquisition work proceeded as usual despite resistance. “Apart from pulling down 49 betel vineyards with the consent of its owners, two orchards of 65 decimals having mango and cashew nuts tree covers were acquired today by IDCO personnel. The betel vines growers received Rs 60lakh as compensation while the orchard owners were paid Rs 57,000 compensation against the loss of fruit bearing trees,” said Nrusingha Charan Swain, special land acquisition officer.

Since commencement of the land acquisition process, 434 betel vineyards have been pulled down and 38.69 acres of land acquired for the project. Compensation to the tune of Rs 4.45crore has been paid.

Officials, however, admitted that there was mild tension in the area following allegations by a betel grower from Bayanalakanda village that his farm was burnt down by the project supporters.

Somnath Samal, the 34-year-old grower, said: “I had been asked to give away the 28-decimal betel plot. They wanted to take possession of my vineyard because it was strategically located on the borderline of project area. But I had flatly turned down the offer. At about 8pm, I saw my betel vineyard on fire with the whole thing being reduced to ashes within minutes.”

Officials said that the situation was under control now.