C'garh assembly: Cong stages walkout over farmers' rehab issue

Opposition Congress today staged a walkout in Chhattisgarh Assembly, accusing the state government of negligence towards the rehabilitation of displaced farmers' families in Gobra Nawapara village of Raipur district.
Raising the issue during the question hour, senior Congress MLA Dhanendra Sahu sought to know whether the families displaced due to the 'Atal Vihar Yojna' of State Housing Board, had been rehabilitated.
In his reply, Revenue Minister Premprakash Pandey said the government had allocated 26.248 hectares of land to Chhattisgarh Housing Board for the Yojna in Gobra Nawapara.
"A total of 59 encroachers, including 12 people belonging to scheduled caste and 16 from scheduled tribe and 31 from other categories, were removed from that land and they were not provided land for rehabilitation," he said.

Dissatisfied with his answer, Sahu said SC/ST farmers had been residing on that land in Gobra Nawapara for several decades and were farming there and therefore, the state must compensate them.
Supporting him on the issue, another Congress MLA Bhupesh Baghel said, the displaced farmers should either be provided land at some other place or be given appropriate compensation.

However, Pandey told the House that there was no such provision for the resettlement of encroachers.
"Land has already been sanctioned to the Housing Board and the project has started taking shape," he said.
The Leader of Opposition in the Assembly T S Singhdeo termed it as an "injustice" to the farmers.

The opposition members created uproar after the minister failed to give them satisfactory answers and then walked out of the assembly.