‘Onus is on UT to identify land’

MOHALI: The Chandigarh administration will identify land for an alternative route to Shaheed Bhagat Singh International Airport in Mohali and then inform Punjab government. The two sides had agreed to an alternative route from Chandigarh to the airport, with Punjab governor and UT administrator Banwarilal Purohit approving the plan. UT and Mohali also informed the HC about the agreement under which Chandigarh would identify the land to be acquired and inform the Punjab government, which would direct the Mohali administration to carry out the acquisition and award announcement process.
Mohali deputy commissioner (DC) Aashika Jain said, “We are waiting for the UT Administration to identify the land to be acquired and inform us.It is for us then to start the acquisition process and give the acquired land to Chandigarh. Thereafter, Chandigarh will construct the road as an alternate route and Mohali will incur expenses.”
The proposed alignment covers 0.82 km stretch of road passing within Punjab boundary, for which 14.07 acres of land is to be acquired. The bone of contention was whether the expenditure on account of land acquisition was to be borne by Punjab or Chandigarh. Now that the issue has been resolved, the decks are clear for the project. The administration has been deliberating on developing a shorter and alternate route to the airport, as the existing single route is long and residents have to travel 11.5 km to reach the airport from Junction 63. The alternative route has been prepared after consultations with all stakeholders, Punjab government, ministry of defence, IAF authorities and Chandigarh International Airport Limited.