Locals protest Agarwal university land purchase

About 10,000 activists under Srikhetra Milita Sangram Samiti (SMSS), a Puri-based organisation staged a demonstration in the city to oppose the acquisition of around 6,000 acres of land by the Anil Agrarwal Foundation for the Vedanta university project (VUP) in Puri.

“We have demanded the cancellation of the MoU (memorandum of understanding) signed by the Orissa government with the Anil Agarwal Foundation (AAF) for building a multi-disciplinary university in Puri. The company is not eligible to acquire land for the university project as it is not a public limited company”, said Uma Ballav Rath, leader of Vedanta Vishwavidyalaya Virodhi Samiti, an organisation spearheading the movement against Vedanta’s university project.

Rath pointed out that Vedanta’s proposed university project should be shifted to an alternative location as it can come up in a barren patch of land.

Meanwhile, VUP clarified that the 6,000 acres of land alloted by the Orissa government near the Puri-Konark marine drive to AAF will be used only for the purposed of building a university and not for any other purposes.

According to a statement issued by VUP, “AAF, a not-for-profit philanthropic organisation, registered under section 25 of the Companies Act, has been acquiring land at full market value. The organisation has gone well beyond the government’s land acquisition norms in terms of monetary compensation, ex-gratia payments, rehabilitation and other facilities to the land owners.”

It added, “Out of 6,000 acres of land earmarked for the proposed university, only1,300 acres of land is owned by the Jagannath temple in Puri. The temple trust has agreed to sell the land for this educational mission and the foundation is acquiring the same at a fair market value”.