Villagers in front of the temple where the BAPL officials were confined. Picture by Santosh Mandal

Durgapur, Oct. 24: Over 100 farmers whose land has been earmarked for acquisition to shift electricity towers from near the runway of the under-construction Andal airport allegedly confined for four hours officials doing a land survey today.

The farmers accused Bengal Aerotropolis Projects Ltd (BAPL), which is promoting the Rs 10,000-crore Airport City project on 1,818 acres, of stepping on their land “illegally” and “forcibly” as they had refused to sell their plots several times.

The attack comes a little over a month after the Singapore government-owned Changi Airports International, a stakeholder in BAPL, requested chief minister Mamata Banerjee and her government to help remove impediments in shifting six electricity towers from near the airport runway and a speedy resolution to the land problem.

BAPL requires around 70 acres in Andal and Laodoha to shift the transmission towers of power utilities DVC and WBSETCL. BAPL is willing to purchase the land directly from the owners but a section of villagers is reluctant to give up their plots alleging that the private company was more interested in real estate than setting up the airport.

A series of meetings BAPL and the local administration held with landowners yielded no result.

A BAPL official said if the company did not get the land to shift the transmission towers, it would consider taking the power lines underground.

“We will have to think of taking the lines underground but it will escalate the project cost and take much more time. However, the matter is under discussion. We will apply for the final DGCA approval after resolving the issue,” the official said.

Around 9.30am today, farmers pumping water out of their paddy fields in Andal’s Patshaora village spotted the BAPL officials taking pictures of the land and asked them why they were doing so.

The farmers started protesting when the officials told them that they were surveying the land identified for acquisition.

“The farmers shouted at us and some of them pushed us around. We tried to escape but they dragged us to a temple and detained us there for four hours,” an official who do not wish to be named said.

A large contingent from Laodoha police station and the pradhan of the Trinamul-run Icchapur gram panchayat, Ujjal Mandal, arrived at the spot around 1.30pm and rescued the officials.

Mandal assured the farmers that their land would not be acquired forcibly. “If the farmers do not agree to give up their land, we will not force them. Our party is against forcible land acquisition,” he said.

Basudeb Gorai, a portion of whose land had been acquired for the project in 2007, said: “Another portion of my remaining land falls in the 70 acres identified for acquisition for shifting the towers. In 2007, BAPL, with the help of the then Left government, had taken our land at throwaway prices. We did not resist then as we had thought the socio-economic scenario of the area would change once the airport came up.”

“The land was handed over to BAPL in 2009 but the airport is yet to become operational. BAPL is inviting real estate companies to set up housing projects here. They are not interested in completing the airport and we will not give them any more land for promoting real estate.”