The KPT claims it owns the land on which the Rotary Club has agreed to construct 400 dwellings. But the Gandhidham Development Authority, in its letter of approval of construction, says the land belongs to the State Government. As the dispute remains unresolved, the Rotary Club has stopped construction.

Incidentally, the construction work started only recently because the State Government and KPT took one year to finalise the rehabilitation scheme.

Defending the GDA's action, Kutch Collector Kamal Dayani, who is ex-officio chairman of GDA, remarked, ``There is a long-pending dispute about ownership of land between the port trust and the State Government, and we have to protect the interests of the government.''

At the same time, Dayani said the Government was committed to the scheme and had contributed one-third of the cost of each dwelling unit, which is Rs 50,000. ``There is no reason for the KPT or any other agency to stop work'', Dayani remarked.

The port authorities, however, are not ready to accept the State Government's claim. Sources said KPT chairman H L Kadalabaju and secretary P Singh had taken up the issue at a high-level meeting, which was held in Gandhinagar on August 6, to review progress of the scheme. Among those present were officials from the Centre.

Although Central officials expressed unhappiness over the action of the GDA, the latter hasn't modified its orders, sources said. Singh said they would take up the issue again at the next meeting of the committee which is monitoring the scheme.

The KPT had allotted 23 hectares of green land, valued at about Rs 20 crores, at a token price of Re 1 for the purpose of building 3,011 houses. It also obtained a special sanction of Rs 2 crores for development of the land and provision of basic facilities.

Sources said the matter had to be taken up with the Centre to facilitate release of the land at a token price. Chief Minister Keshubhai Patel himself had urged the Surface Transport Minister to approve the KPT proposal as a ``one-time exception'' because Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee had promised rehabilitation of affected persons.

``Where was the need for the Chief Minister to obtain the Centre's approval if the State Government actually owned the land?'' a KPT officer remarked. He said the GDA, which was set up by the State Government in 1957 to regulate construction in the newly created port township, had no business to change ownership of land.

The KPT was originally given 6,920 acres for development of a new township at Gandhidham and Adipur in the 1950s. Over the years, it gave large chunks of land to organisations like railways, IFFCO, Free Trade Zone and to port employees and private persons. It is now left with only around 800 acres and the State Government is eyeing it, sources said.

In 1993 the then Congress Government first demanded that the port trust should hand over whatever land it had. Since then, GDA hasn't approved a single plan of the KPT, though it continues to approve construction plans of individuals who have been allotted land by the port trust, sources said.