A public hearing organised by the Andhra Pradesh Capital Region Development Authority (AP-CRDA) at Penumaka on Thursday to record villagers’ opinions and convince the farmers to give up their holdings to facilitate construction of the capital city under the Land Pooling Scheme (LPS) ended inconclusively.
The landowners stayed away from the hearing on the ground that the objections raised by them against LPS on previous occasions were ignored and alleged that cases were are being foisted on those raising their voice against the scheme.
According to official sources, the CRDA has got a public announcement made that the farmers unwilling to give their lands under the LPS could flag their concerns at the public hearing but none of them responded, forcing the authorities to wind up after a few hours.
The villagers declared their intention to boycott the CRDA’s stock-taking exercise by engaging a drum-beater. They made it clear that they would keep away from such interactions in future.
Persecution alleged
The landowners reiterated that they preferred to retain their holdings and the CRDA officials tried to persuade them, but to no avail. They said contrary to what had been stated in the Assembly, that the farmers would not be coerced into parting with their lands, cases were being booked against them.
Besides, Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu wanted to invoke the provisions of the Land Acquisition (LA) Act, 2013 if the farmers did not relent, albeit after giving the farmers some time to fall in line.
The farmers of Penumaka and Undavalli, owning about 1,500 acres, had been against the LPS from the beginning and spurned the offers of various benefits envisaged under it.
As the farmers stuck to their ground, the government has decided to take over their lands as per the LA Act. It is in this context that the CRDA made the fresh bid to allay the apprehensions of farmers.
