Kendrapara, Sept. 28: The state's first-ever rehabilitation and resettlement project for the people displaced by sea erosion in the district is stuck for a clearance by the National Board For Wildlife.

The project to relocate the people from their ancestral homes at Satabhaya and Kanhupur is scheduled to be over by October 31. The resettlement colony is coming up at Bagapatia village, which is, according to the records, a ringed out village of the Bhitarkanika Wildlife Sanctuary. A ringed out village is a settlement on the fringes of a forest area.

"We are waiting for the clearance from the board for the settlement of the people at the Bagapatia colony," said additional district magistrate Dhananjay Swain.

The site has received the clearance from the state environment and forest department, but the final clearance from the national board is awaited, said Swain.

The Satabhaya village were eager to leave their ancestral homes because of the advancing sea.

Bimal Prasanna Acharya , the forest division officer of Rajnagar Mangrove (wildlife) said the state forest department had given consent to exclude Bagapatia from ringed out village classification.

In 1975, Bagapatia was notified within the Bhitarkanika Wildlife Sanctuary as a ringed out village. "A proposal in this regard from the revenue administration had been sent to the State Wildlife Board. The board had forwarded the proposal to the national board for clearance. We are yet to receive the clearance from it," said Acharya.

Forest and revenue departments conducted a joint survey on Bagapatia. At present, Bagapatia is bereft of forest cover.

Some 719 families displaced by the sea at Satabhaya are being relocated at Bagapatia. People are building their own houses with the state funds under the Biju Pucca Ghar Yojana. However, the beneficiaries have not been provided with records of rights or patta as the administration is yet to receive the forest department clearance.

After the relocation, the area would be under the possession of state forest department. It would be used for mangrove regeneration programme, excluding the land used for agriculture, said a forest official.