Gujarat has acquired nearly all of the private land required for the Ahmedabad-Mumbai bullet train project three years after the land acquisition process began. In contrast, according to officials, 24 percent of land in Maharashtra has yet to be acquired.
“Over 99.4 percent of land needed for the project in Gujarat has been acquired. We are monitoring the process on a daily basis,” P Swaroop, Commissioner of Land Reforms and Ex-officio secretary in the revenue department, Government of Gujarat, told The Indian Express.
“Out of a total of 736 hectares of private land that was to be acquired in the state, only 6.6 hectares is pending. Those pending are small plots in Surat, Vadodara, Navsari, Bharuch and Ahmedabad districts. The acquisition process will be completed within a month or so,” he added. The first notifications for the acquisition of land for this project was issued by the revenue department in January 2018.
According to the official, land acquisition in the districts of Kheda, Anand, and Valsad is 100 percent complete.
As of January 31, 2022, the National High-Speed Rail Corporation (NHSRCL) had paid a total of Rs 5,707 crore in compensation to 6,110 project affected persons (PAPs) in Gujarat.
The Government of India had previously set a December 2018 deadline for completing land acquisition for the entire bullet train project, which involved 1,025 hectares of private land and 145 hectares of government land.
The NHSRCL said the construction of bullet train corridor in Gujarat was progressing in all the eight districts of the state which includes construction of pillars for the elevated corridor in Navsari and Valsad districts, construction of Surat station and Sabarmati terminal hub and construction of bridges over Narmada and Mahi rivers.
While the acquisition of 7.9 hectares of land in the union territory of Dadra and Nagar Haveli that falls on the route has also been fully completed, the acquisition in Maharashtra has been lagging.
Of the 336 hectares of private and government land needed for the project in Maharashtra, a total of 256 hectares has been acquired as on January 31, 2022. This includes 56.13 hectares of government land.
In addition to the compensation paid in Gujarat, NHSRCL has paid Rs 2,110 crore to 1,572 project affected persons in Maharashtra.
The process of acquiring land in Mumbai’s suburbs has yet to begin. NHSRCL stated that as of January 31, 2022, none of the 3.92 hectares of private land and 0.9 hectares of government land had been acquired.
In September 2017, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe laid the foundation stone for the Rs 1.1 lakh crore Sabarmati project in Ahmedabad.