At a hugely attended meeting, they threatened to re-launch an agitation next month and even stop port operations if their demands were not met by July 20.
People in the twin port town of Gandhidham-Adipur are again up in arms against the various land-related 'exorbitant' fees collected by Kandla Port Trust, the only landlord in the Kandla complex.
At a hugely attended meeting, they threatened to re-launch an agitation next month and even stop port operations if their demands were not met by July 20. Saying 'enough is enough' at the meeting held in Gandhidham on Sunday, Hiralal Parakh, president of the Gandhidham Chamber of Commerce and Industries, one of the richest and most vocal corporate bodies in the state, said that the port trust could not go on 'fleecing' its residents who got the land on lease for housing and
commercial establishments.
He said the lessees have to pay ground rent and mortgage fee for getting NOC for bank loans and transfer fees when they sell their property.
He said that the fees were regularly increased by huge amounts, which was hurting the populace.
He added that they are threatening a March 2008 like prolonged agitation which had made the Union shipping ministry to intervene and bow to the people's will. Mahesh Tirthani, general secretary of the chamber, said that there were two types of land in the Gandhidam area, one owned by the union government and administered by the port trust. The land with the latter was known as sector area, while the other was the Sindhu Resettlment
Corporation (SRC) land.
He said in both the cases the transfer fee went to the port trust. In the case of SCR land, the transfer fee was based on the jantri rates of the state government, while in the case of port land, it was according to the port trust formula.
All these fees worked out to some 1000 % increase in the past ten years. He said the high court had given a stay on the increase made in 2004 and now again the port trust had gone to the Tariff Authority for Major Ports (TAMP) for another increase in 2009-10.
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