Gujarat High Court reserves order on Nano writ

A division bench of the Gujarat high court on Monday reserved its order on the public interest litigation (PIL) that was filed challenging the Nano project in the state. A bench headed by chief justice KS Radhakrishnan gave the direction, after hearing for the PIL was completed.

The PIL, filed by Rashtriya Kisan Dal, a social organisation, claims that the state government has neglected rights of the farmers and poor people while offering huge benefits to the Nano project. It thus challenged the government for the land allocation and sops given to the Tata Motors for their proposed Nano project at Sanand.

The organisation also claims that the state government has allocated 1,200 acre of land against the necessity of only 645 acre land and that too without providing ample compensation to the land-owner farmers for their plots of land.

On the other hand, the state government has submitted that the then government in power then had disbursed compensation to the land owners, way back before India’s independence. It also contended that the Nano project will provide livelihood to the people of the area and that it had invited Tata Motors for the development of the state. It therefore prayed that the writ petition should be rejected.

It is worth recalling here that only a week ago, the high court had rejected two writ petitions filed by two farmers whose lands were allocated for the Nano project. The farmers had raised the issue that the government has illegally allocated the land without paying them  compensation.