People evicted from Moolampilly have petitioned the Kerala Government demanding rehabilitation and compensation. The petitions were submitted during the recent Navakerala Sadas in Ernakulam district. Navakerala Sadas is a part of the Kerala Government’s outreach programme.
It has been a long wait for those who were evicted to make way for providing road and rail connectivity to the Vallarpadam International Container Transshipment Terminal in Kochi. They have waited nearly 16 years for the execution of a compensation package. In fact, 34 evictees died without receiving compensation. In 2018, the then LDF government, on March 19, announced a package in the face of stiff protests in the aftermath of the forceful eviction at Moolampilly on February 6 the same year.
“It was decided that the evictee will submit applications in their individual capacity rather than under the aegis of the coordination committee. The applications were submitted during the Navakerala Sadas in Vypeen, Ernakulam and Kalamassery Assembly constituencies held in December. Apart from an acknowledgement [of receiving the petitions], there has been no response,” Francis Kalathungal, general convener of the Moolampilly Coordination Committee, said.
Unfit rehabilitation sites
Out of the 316 families that were evicted from seven villages, only 54 families have so far managed to move into houses built on rehabilitation plots. However, some of the houses have either developed cracks or tilted sideways due to the marshy nature of the plots.
“In fact, 168 plots across two sites in Kakkanad were found unfit for rehabilitation by the Public Works Department itself. The Kerala High Court’s direction to prepare the plots in one of those sites on a plea by evictees by taking the evictees into confidence also remains to be complied with. There has also been no action on the demand to exempt rehabilitation plots in Kothad, Moolampilly and Kakkanad alongside water bodies from the Coastal Regulation Zone that imposed restrictions on constructions,” said Mr. Kalathungal.
A monitoring committee formed with the District Collector as chairman to review the implementation of the package has met since 2018. Even the decisions taken by the Committee like the distribution of evictees’ cards for the beneficiaries remain unhonoured. The promise of jobs to one member of the evicted families is another unfulfilled promise.
The State government has also not so far written to the Central Government to exempt from the central income tax levied on the compensation amount paid to evictees because of which many of them continue to receive penalty notice from the central income tax department.
