MAPUSA: Farmers affected by the proposed airport at Mopa have strongly denounced "pitiful rates of compensation" the government has offered to compensate them with. Farmers believe that their land has been unfairly acquired by paying a meagre compensation of 20 and 38 per sq m and has warned of a bigger agitation if the government doesn't come up with a solution before December 19.
The affected farmers from Mopa, Varkhand, Casarvarnem, Chandel, Uguem, Amerem and Poroscodem have decided to come together to fight for a better compensation for parting with their land to the greenfield Mopa airport.
The land losers from the Mopa village under the banner of 'Mopa Shetkari Saghatana' has submitted a memorandum to the chairman of the state law commission, Ramakant Khalap, urging him to pursue their matter - that they be adequately compensated for their land being taken away from them.
According to farmers, they have been offered 20 per sq m for tenant property land and 38 for ownership land. In tenancy land, 10 will go to the tenant while 10 will go to the owner. They are not happy with the compensation being presently offered to them and have therefore expressed their resentment over the project.
The farmers called on Khalap, as the commission has come up with a progressive draft land acquisition policy based on the Haryana model that attempts to address to some degree, the unfair measures in government policy for land acquisition.
Khalap addressed the farmers at a meeting on Sunday at Devi Sateri Mauli temple in Mopa in the presence of Prabhakar Narulkar, Mandar Joshi, former Mopa sarpanch Balkrishna Parab and panch Jaiprakash Parab among others.
Addressing the gathering, Khalap said the government is doing injustice to farmers by paying such an amount. "Farmers will get even more compensation if they give their land for stone quarrying purpose. The purpose of bringing the airport to Pernem will not fulfill the purpose if farmers are pillaged of their only valuable resource at low rates of compensation," Khalap said.
The farmers have now decided to convene meetings in all affected villages to unite themselves to fight for the right compensation from the government. "The government has no comprehensive policy of compensation and randomly decides the land prices. The Land Acquisition Act, 1894, is a British era act and is ruthlessly used to snatch the means of survival from the poor farmers which it is not acceptable to us," said Rajesh Parab, a Mopa villager leading the agitation.
He said a total of 90 lakh sq m of land will be acquired for the airport for which around 28 lakh sq m of land will be taken from farmers from Mopa village itself. "We will convene meetings in all affected villages with the support of Khalap to raise awareness and will decide on the course of further action after 19th of December," Parab said.
"The government is taking away land without any written assurances. For those who have already accepted compensation and parted with their land - they don't have any certificate of land sharing," Parab said. "What is the guarantee that this government will provide us jobs, we have no proof of land sharing. Tomorrow if the house is dissolved whom do we contact?" he added.
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