Reliance’s Raigad SEZ faces flak

Pen (Maharashtra): Even as Singur and Nandigram simmer in West Bengal, signs of serious trouble are evident in Raigad district of Maharashtra where Reliance Industries, India’s largest private sector conglomerate, is setting up a 14,000-hectare Special Economic Zone (SEZ), billed to be the biggest in Asia.

Farmers in 46 villages in Pen, Uran, Panvel and Alibag tehsils of the paddy growing coastal district of Konkan are angry as the land acquisition process is in flagrant breach of repeated promises by chief minister Vilasrao Deshmukh.

It is no different from farmers’ protests against land acquisition for industry in Singur and Nandigram of West Bengal or in Orissa for South Korean steel major Posco’s project.

Vaishali Patil of Jagatikaran Virodhi Kriti Samiti said the government was set to issue a notification under the Land Acquisition Act, which provides for forcible takeover of land. “We lifted the blockade of the Mumbai-Goa highway March 23 after the CM’s assurance and dispersed from our April 5 rally in Mumbai, only to be betrayed,” Patil said.