Kedar seeks scrutiny of all Samruddhi land deals

Nagpur: Congress MLA from Saoner and former minister for animal husbandry in the MVA government Sunil Kedar has questioned the necessity of building Hindu Hruday Samrat Balasaheb Thackeray Maharashtra Samruddhi Mahamarg connecting Nagpur to Mumbai.
Addressing a meeting organized by Bahujan Sangharsh Samiti — an organization taking up causes of the depressed classes, Kedar said the entire project was unwarranted. There was no demand for such a road either.
The highway, which has been dubbed as a game-changer by its protagonists, has led to the state government incurring a debt of Rs52,000 crore. It was built even though the Centre had already allocated Rs73,000 crore for upgrading the existing Nagpur-Mumbai highway.
The state has spent Rs52,000 crore and yet the entire expressway up to Mumbai is not ready. Completing it may entail another massive sum, said Kedar. “Where is the need to build a new road spending such a huge amount if the central government has already made an outlay of Rs73,000 crore for upgrading the existing Mumbai to Nagpur highway,” he said.
Kedar said the entire process of land acquisition for Samruddhi highway should be scrutinized. “Details of every person who got the compensation should be probed. Information about when did these persons who got hefty amounts of compensation became owners of the farmland, which was taken over for the project needs to brought out,” he said.
“Once we form government, we will first bring a white paper on the transactions related to the expressway project,” he said.
On being pointed out that work on the road continued even during the MVA regime, Kedar said he had always opposed it, and the work continued only because it had already begun.
Replying to a TOI query, Kedar admitted there is a likelihood that a number of persons, who had inkling about the project, had purchased land which was slated to be acquired. The four-time compensation is entirely tax-free and such a racket has happened in the entire route, he said.
“They say Samruddhi Expressway a is game changer, especially for transport. The cheapest mode of transport can be waterways. If waterways are not available, we have the railways. Can any other mode be cheaper than the railways? However, the road project was taken out of sheer adamance to prove a point,” said Kedar.