26-04-2025
State comes up with final order to acquire land for Sabarimala airport
The State government has brought out the final order for acquiring land for the Sabarimala Greenfield airport project under the Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation, and Resettlement (LARR) Act, 2013.
The order, issued by Sheeba George, Additional Secretary (Revenue) is in accordance with the provisions of sub-section (1) of section 11 of the LARR Act and states that a total of 1,001.873 hectares (2,475.68 acres) is required to be acquired for the project in Erumeli South and Manimala villages. This includes 2,263-acre Cheruvally estate, which is currently under the possession of the Ayana Charitable Trust and land located outside the estate.
Individuals involved in the land acquisition process are encouraged to raise any grievances within 15 days regarding the updating of land records or titles in relation to the land proposed for acquisition. Objections concerning the area and suitability of the land proposed for acquisition, justification for public purpose and the findings of the Social Impact Assessment report should be submitted within 60 days.
'Any objection or statement which is received after the due date and which does not clearly explain as how the objector is interested in the land, is liable to be summarily rejected,' reads the order.
The new order was issued after considering the Social Impact Assessment report, recommendations from the expert committee based on the SIA report and the district Collector's report on it. In the report, the District Collector had stated that the land be acquired under Section 7 (5) of the LARR Act.
This is the second time that the State government is going through the land acquisition process as the previous notifications for both the SIA and land acquisition were revoked by the government following objections from the Ayana Charitable Trust (formerly Gospel for Asia) and local residents. They challenged in the court the legitimacy of the initial SIA study, which had been conducted by the Centre for Management Development, citing the organisation's links with the State Industries department.
In the next step, the government will begin the official survey of the land as per section 12 and prepare a file of the precise extent of land to be acquired along with its survey numbers. It will be followed by a declaration of the rehabilitation and resettlement (RR) package, as outlined in section 19 (1) of the LARR Act.
Stup Consultants Ltd, appointed by the Kerala State Industrial Development Corporation (KSIDC), is in the process of preparing the detailed project report (DPR) for the project. Once the DPR is completed and submitted to the KSIDC, it will be forwarded to the Union Ministry of Civil Aviation for further review.
