Govt should not allot portion of NH for airport expn: Residents

Tiruchirapalli, Apr 2 (UNI) Residents of 11 areas, including J K Nagar, Thirumurugan Nagar, Loudu Nagar and Mohammed Nagar in Tiruchirapalli, appealed to the Tamil Nadu Government to be firm in its earlier stand of not allotting a portion of the Tiruchirapalli-Pudukottai National Highway for the phase two expansion of the airport.

In a memorandum submitted to the district Collector, J K Nagar Welfare Association President M Rajagopal pointed out that a decision for not handing over the portion of Tiruchirapalli-Pudukkottai NH was taken in the higher level officials meeting at Chennai on October 12, last year. Following this, the Airport Authority of India (AAI) had also changed its master plan for phase two expansion and sought an alternative 456 hectares of land from the state government on December 12 last year, he added.

Despite this, the AAI and other agencies concerned attempted to close down the portion of Tiruchirapalli-Pudukkottai NH and also acquired a huge space spread over 11 residential areas, adjacent to the NH, he said.

He said after getting clearance from the AAI, about 15,000 people were residing at 4,000 houses in the area. Hence, the acquisition of these residential areas and the closure of the portion of the Tiruchirapalli-Pudukkottai NH would give untold hardships for them.

They wanted the state government to be firm on its earlier stand and also insisted that the Centre must give up its move to acquire their land for the proposed phase two expansion of the Tiruchiraplli airport.

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