Ring road hits roadblock

Amaravati: Land acquisition is going to be a major problem for the Inner Ring Road (IRR) in Amaravati. Though the AP Capital Region Development Authority (APCRDA) has notified the alignment for the IRR and completed the process of inviting objections from public there is no word from the government as to how it was going to address the problem of land acquisitio As the state government has decided to take up capital city works on a war footing and complete some important projects by the end of this year, the construction of IRR is crucial to connect capital city with Guntur and Krishna districts and also national and state highways.

The APCRDA, which completed the process of inviting objections by March 19 and scrutinized them, is now waiting for the policy decision from the state government on IRR. The APCRDA has finalised the IRR alignment after dividing it into two sections. According to officials of APCRDA, the IRR will have a length of 97 km with a width of 75 mts. The CRDA has put three options before the government for taking the IRR project. 

Under first option, 1,428 acres (for 2 sections) of land has to be acquired for the IRR and the estimated cost is Rs 2,382 crore for the land acquisition. Under second option, it has proposed Land Pooling System (LPS) for the project in which growth corridor has been proposed as part of IRR.

Under third option, the estimated gross land procurement is 28,515 acres and the cost of the project is 47,882 crore. A senior officer of APCRDA told The Hans India, the state government did not take a decision on land acquisition so far and we were not given any policy decision over the crucial ring road project. 

“We don’t know when the state government will take up this project. The government has not given clarity on whether land acquisition or land pooling system is adoptable for the IRR project. We can only notify the project after a policy decision is taken by the state government,” he said.

The senior officer also said some villages may not agree for implementation of land pooling system. He said the project involved huge expenditure as large tracts of private land has to be acquired for road construction. “Huge funds have to be mobilised if the government goes to land acquisition for IRR,” he said.

According to information, the government may consider Harichandrapuram, Vaikuntapuram, Vaddamanu, Peddaparimi, Ketanakonda, Kotikalapudi, Daamuluru, Endroyi, Ananthavaram, Karlapudi, Nekkalu, Motadaka, Thadikonda, Kanteru, Kaza and Chinakakani villages if it wants to introduce land pooling system for acquiring land for the IRR project.

By K Varaprasada Rao