Islampur, July 22: The Teesta Barrage Project has been delayed because of lack of land and initiative from the state government, the Union minister of state for water resources, river development and Ganga rejuvenation said in Lok Sabha yesterday.

Minister Sanjeev Kumar Balyan said the Teesta project authority, a wing of the state irrigation department, hadn't sent utilisation certificates for the Rs 180 crore that the Centre had sanctioned for the work in the past five years.

In reply to questions raised by the CPM MP of Raiganj, Md Salim, Balyan said land acquisition was the principal deterrent to the project.

"The main hindrance in timely completion of the project is land acquisition. The state government has been requested to prepare a comprehensive proposal/solution for the same. However, the state government has not submitted any proposal...," Balyan said.

The main objective of the Teesta project launched in 1975 with an initial estimate of Rs 30 crore was to build a network of rivers in north Bengal, provide irrigation to 9.22 lakh hectares of land and generate 67.50MW of power. After 41 years, over Rs 1,400 crore has been spent and the estimated cost now is Rs 2,988.61. The project provides water to 60,000 hectares and generates 20MW.

"There are about 150 pending cases related to land acquisition, particularly in Islampur subdivision of North Dinajpur through which canals on the right bank of Teesta were supposed to pass," an irrigation department official said.

State irrigation minister Rajib Banerjee said: "It is true that there are land problems... we will speak to officials to know how many people are not ready to part with land, what their demands are and other details."