After the Congress -Trinamool combine reaped electoral success in the recent Lok Sabha elections in Bengal, much of which was attributed to the Left Front’s government faulty handling of land acquisition in Nandigram and Singur, the opposition is once again trying to outperform the Marxists on the same issue in the June 28 civic polls.

One such place where the issue of land acquisition is being played out is the Rajarhat-Gopalpur municipality as the incumbent CPM-dominated civic authorities have failed to resolve the disputes over acquiring land for some of its projects.

The most significant among these is the truck terminal-cum-logistics hub project, which was proposed to come up at Ganti village (ward 2).

After the civic authorities made an attempt to acquire around 10 acres of land for the project, farmers, with the help of local Trinamool leaders, vehemently protested against the acquisition.

In spite of having control in 21 of the 27 wards, the CPM had to halt the project and finally declared that no notice will be issued for land acquisition for the project unless villagers give consent to hand over their land to the municipality.

“We have stalled the project since villagers protested against it. We will not acquire the land forcibly from the farmers,” said Manik Chandra Samadder, Executive Officer of Rajarhat-Gopalpur municipality.

But the Trinamool thinks that CPM has not given up the project and will restart working on it after the civic polls end.

“The CPM-dominated municipality has put the logistic hub on hold fearing a set back in the civic polls. However, even if they win in the municipal polls, we will never allow them to acquire the fertile land from the poor farmers,” said Trinamool’s Barasat MP Kakali Ghosh Dastidar.

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