Bid to reclaim 'encroached' government plot faces resistance; Boundary work halted
Telegraph | 19 March 2025
The Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) has put on hold its plans to erect a wall around a government plot on Prince Anwar Shah Road after around 100 shop owners who have “encroached” the land declined to vacate it.
Last week, the civic body had asked the “encroachers” to clear the plot by Monday (March 17).
A KMC team had to return from the area on Monday as it could not find space to put up the wall around the perimeter of 355 Prince Anwar Shah Road.
An official of the civic body said they would now write to the “higher authorities” about the next course of action.
A boundary wall on only a small stretch of the 29-cottah plot has been built.
The civic body started raising the wall last month. It could not proceed as most parts were encroached.
“We went to 355 Prince Anwar Shah Road on Monday since we had asked the encroachers to vacate the plot by then. Since they did not vacate their spaces we could not raise the wall on any new portion,” said a KMC official.
“There were many closed shops and there was no way to know whether they were vacated or had stock inside,” said the official.
A walk around the plot on Tuesday afternoon showed that nearly half of the land still has shops and a market.
A Trinamool Congress office is located along the northern periphery of the plot. A local Trinamool leader had earlier told Metro they would not resist the eviction drive.
Posters decrying the decision to evict hawkers have been put up around the market running from the land by Citu, the labour arm of the CPM.
“We sought help from the local Trinamool leadership too. But they said they couldn’t do anything since the government had decided to reclaim the land,” said a shop owner who admitted they had been occupying the government property for decades.
“Most of us have shops here for over two to four decades. Where will we go and what will we do if the government evicts us?” asked a vegetable seller.
“Reduce the size of our shops but give us space to run our business,” said a woman.
The state information and cultural affairs department owns the plot.
The land on 355 Prince Anwar Shah Road, prime south Calcutta real estate, did not have a boundary wall earlier and encroachers had a free run.
The encroachers were issued a warning by the KMC on March 11 and told to pack up by Monday, March 17, so the civic body could build the wall.
The land reclaim process from “unauthorised occupants” started after chief minister Mamata Banerjee mentioned this piece of land while speaking about encroachments on government properties and public spaces at a televised meeting in June 2024.