New Town: Two residential towers in New Town's Mahisbathan that come in the way of the New Garia-Airport Metro link will have a portion pulled down, railway officials said on Tuesday.

Officials of Rail Vikas Nigam Ltd, the implementing agency of the 32km project, said they would soon hire a consultant and an architecture firm to suggest how to slice a 3.2m-wide section off two towers of Ramdhanu Apartment from the front.

The third tower in the housing estate will remain unscathed.

"Ramdhanu complex falls between two proposed pillars of the viaduct on which the tracks of the New Garia-Airport link will be laid. Unlike four other buildings in the vicinity, the residential towers need not be pulled down completely. Only the front portion of the two towers will infringe on the viaduct," a railway official said.

"A survey has indicated an infringement of 1.2m. A safety clearance of 2m has to be factored in. Which means a total of 3.2m will have to be sliced off."

This is the first such engineering challenge faced by any Metro project in Calcutta. "There are instances of buildings having been sliced for infrastructure projects in other cities. But this has never happened in Calcutta before.... It's a high-precision work, so we are hiring consultants to find out how to go about it," the official said.

Though only a portion of the two towers will be razed, all residents will have to be evacuated during the demolition.

"Once the railway authorities finalise their plan and let us know about their schedule, we will talk to the residents of the buildings about evacuation and compensation," said Sabyasachi Dutta, the mayor of the Bidhannagar Municipal Corporation.

The two towers - both six-storeyed - of Ramdhanu complex are the only residential buildings that are standing in the way of the New Garia-Airport Metro project.

Of the other four buildings, one housed a government primary school and was evacuated a year ago.

One of the other buildings housed a hotel and another a string of commercial establishments. Demolition of all these buildings are on.

Also on the list is another hotel, in regard to which the West Bengal Land Reforms and Tenancy Tribunal has ordered that the status quo be maintained till June 6.

Mayor Dutta has said the owners of the three private buildings - which partially or fully occupy government plots - would be paid the structural cost as compensation.

No compensation will be paid for the land because the buildings had come up after the plots were acquired by the railways.

Officials in the North 24-Parganas district administration said the Ramdhanu complex was built before the notification for land acquisition was issued. "So, the compensation will have to be calculated after speaking to the residents," an official said.

The first three floors of the two towers have commercial establishments, while the top three are occupied by 36 families, residents said.

Mukul Khan, a resident of the complex, said Ramdhanu had figured on a list accompanying a demolition notice sent by the district magistrate of North 24-Parganas three months ago. The latest notice, issued on March 21, did not mention the complex.

The residents had moved the high court after the first notice but the plea is yet to be heard.

"No one from the civic body has visited us to tell us what to do," Khan said.