The demand for cause of building service lanes along the city stretch of the Thanjavur Highway is getting shriller with the Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam (DMDK) staging a protest here on Wednesday condemning the delay in meeting the felt need of the residents.
The issue had been festering ever since the Tiruchi-Thanjavur section of National Highway 67 was widened into a four-lane by the National Highways Authority of India a few years ago.
Residents, organised into a federation, had been fighting for the construction of the service lanes on the 14.5-km stretch since 2009-10 when the NHAI took up the project to four-lane the highway.
The Union Ministry of Road Transport and Highways had issued a public notification, declaring its intention to acquire land for laying service lanes for a distance of nearly 15 km from Ariyamangalam to Thuvakudi.
The State government too had issued an order in August 2011 sanctioning Rs. 84.5 crore to be given towards compensation for the land to be acquired for the service lanes along the highway.
But as per the revised estimates of the National Highways Authority of India, Rs. 196 crore was required for laying the service lanes. But the State Highways Department had suggested that the width of the service lanes could be restricted to 45 metres and the land could be acquired to that extent utilising the sanctioned fund.
MLA in action
Residents had been urging the State government to sanction the additional requirement of Rs. 111.5 crore so that the service lanes could be laid as planned by the NHAI.
On Wednesday, a large number of the DMDK workers, including the Tiruverumbur MLA S. Senthil Kumar, staged a demonstration at Tiruverumbur to press the demand.
The workers raised slogans condemning the Centre and State governments for the delay in laying the service lanes.
