NH 47 Bypass work: Tharoor meets Union Minister

NH 47 Bypass work: Tharoor meets Union Minister
Thiruvananthapuram, June 15, 2011 The Hindu
Shashi Tharoor, MP, on Tuesday met Union Minister for Road Transport and Highways C.P. Joshi to press for early completion of the National Highway (NH) 47 bypass from Kovalam to Kaliyikavila.

Shashi Tharoor, MP, on Tuesday met Union Minister for Road Transport and Highways C.P. Joshi to press for early completion of the National Highway (NH) 47 bypass from Kovalam to Kaliyikavila.

Mr. Tharoor stressed the need for completing the long-pending project. He said the project had been envisaged as far back in 1974 and that the people whose land was to be acquired for the project could not be made to wait any longer for the compensation. Mr. Joshi said the matter would be accorded top priority.

The proposal for a combined bypass for NH 47 starting from the entry point in the city at Kazhakuttam and rejoining it at the Kerala-Tamil Nadu border at Kaliyikavila had been taken up by the National Highway Authority of India many years ago and one part of the stretch, from Kazhakuttam to Kovalam Junction, was completed about 10 years ago. But the subsequent work on the Kovalam-Kaliyikavila stretch got bogged down due to various reasons.

An official pressnote quoting the MP said land acquisition was not a hurdle for the project as the survey work on the alignment had been completed and the people to be affected had only wanted the compensation to be awarded quickly.

The project, initially named the ‘Thiruvananthapuram- Neyyatinkara Combined Bypass' envisaged 4/6 laning of the 43 km stretch between Kazhakuttam and Kaliyikavila under the NHDP Phase-III package. The construction of the bypass from Kazhakuttam to Kovalam Junction, a length of 22.6 km, had been completed about 10 years back. The proposal involves construction of a new highway from the Kovalam Junction up to the Kerala border at Kaliyikavila. Land was acquired for the bypass alignment from Kovalam to Kottukal to a width of 45 m.

The remaining length of the alignment passes through eight villages, namely Venkulam, Kanjiramkulam, Puthenkada, Tirupuram, Puzhikunnu, Pottayilkada, Vaduvarakonam, and Ayira, and the survey of the alignment was completed almost 10 years back.

However, the actual acquisition proceedings (except for a short 5 km stretch from Kovalam Juntion to Vizhinjam village) had not been undertaken for this stretch.

Mr. Tharoor said the local population who incidentally had no objection to the acquisition were put to difficulty due to the delay in awarding compensation after the acquisition process ground to a halt. He told the Minister that it was essential from a humanitarian point of view to complete the process swiftly and enable them to relocate and get on with their lives.

Mr. Tharoor said there would be no hitch in taking up the widening of the 22.60 km Kazhakuttam- Kovalam stretch to a four-lane road since the land acquisition on both sides of the road had already been completed. The remaining stretch of the bypass up to the Kerala-Tamil Nadu border (Kaliyikavila) would require the acquisition of 70 hectares (175 acres) of land. An approximate amount of Rs.350 crore would be required to acquire land from Kottukal village to Kaliyikavila. The project will require construction of five underpasses and five overpasses at the junctions of crossroads with the main carriage way, along with major and minor bridges.