Land acquisition for Godavari-Penna interlinking runs into rough weather.

The process of land acquisition for the Godavari-Penna River Interlinking Project has run into rough weather, even as the district administration has initiated a survey in the villages of Amaravathi mandal.

Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu laid the foundation stone for the project at Nakirekallu village in the last week of November.

The district administration has identified that 3,500 acres was needed for the first phase of the project under which the flood from the Godavari would be lifted at Harischandrapuram in Thullur mandal and impounded at Nakirekallu village in Narsaraopet mandal, nearly 90 km away.

Even as a section of senior TDP leaders had opposed the project, questioning its feasibility and the huge expenditure involved in lifting waters to a level of nearly 100 metres above the sea level, the State government decided to go ahead with it.

A senior MP had openly questioned the rationale behind the project entailing a massive expenditure of ₹90,000 crore with the first phase costing  Rs. 6,500 crore.

Meanwhile, the farmers of Pedamadduru village in Amaravathi mandal have been obstructing the survey and revenue officers saying they have no prior information about the land acquisition proposal.

Further, they say that they have not been given any notices on survey of their fertile lands by the State government, forcing the survey personnel to beat a retreat.

It is estimated that 581 acres of land is needed at Pedamadduru.

Amaravathi-Pedamadduru Water Committee Society president P. Madan Mohan, former sarpanch K. Koteswara Rao and former sarpanch P. Sambasiva Rao have objected to the survey.

“While we are not against the project, we are opposing the arbitrary manner in which the government is planning to acquire our lands. We are against the manner in which the survey personnel started to place peg marks in the village,” said J. Veeranjaneyulu, and native of Pedamadduru and secretary of the Akhila Bharatha Panchayat Parishat.

THE HINDU