Nellore: Land acquisition for the much publicised Chennai-Bengaluru industrial corridor has come to a standstill in Nellore district following the demand from land owners to pay Rs 25 to Rs 30 lakh per acre as against Rs 18 lakh being offered by the Andhra Pradesh Industrial Infrastructure Corporation.
As Krishnapatnam Port was included in the CBIC as a node, APIIC officials proposed to acquire 8972.86 acres in 3 mandals including Kota, Vakadu and Chillakur mandals to offer to industries. Patta land is 4279.04 acres out of the total extent. The lands are located at Thamminipat-nam, Momidi, Ballavolu, Vellapalem, Kottapat-nam, Karlapudi and Siddavaram villages.
Officials have taken the issue to the notice of government and are awaiting directions from government to proceed further. Though land acquisition for CBIC was proposed three years ago, the process was delayed for lack of funds for some time and because of higher rates being demanded by landlords now.
It may be mentioned here that government proposed to acquire 15,976 acres for CBIC within a 50 km radius of Krishnapatnam Port to facilitate industries usi-ng the port for imports and exports without spending much on transport.
As of now 4700 acres is available with Krishna-patnam Port and 1500 acres with APIIC. The big task for revenue officials is to procure nearly 4279 acres of patta land besides 4700 acres of government land assigned to several people.
The revenue wing has completed the survey of the identified land on a war footing and also categorized land such as assigned, CJFS, government and patta land with a list of people cultivating them.
District collector R. Muthyala Raju said they have decided to pay Rs 13 lakh per acre for assigned lands and has written to government about the demand for high rate title holders of patta lands.
He said that the district wide policy is to offer Rs 13 lakh for assigned lands and Rs 18 lakh for patta lands. “The APIIC has to buy land from farmers and may not be in a position to offer land at a competitive price to industries if the purchase value is high,” Mr Muthyala Raju said, reminding that the APIIC has to spend huge sums for developing the land and this also adds to the land value.
