Pics: Umesh Marpalli
Daijiworld Media Network - Udupi (HB)
Udupi, Oct 18: Members of All India Agricultural Workers' Union, Karnataka, on Tuesday, October 17, staged a protest in front of City Municipality Council, near Alankar Talkies here, demanding house sites for the shelterless.
District secretary, AIAWU, Venkatesh Koni addressed the protestors and said, "The protest is organised, demanding title deed rights for the shelterless. There were many protests in the regard. It has been four years now, yet sites are not sanctioned.
"The AIAWU insists a fulfilment of its demands. According to the information on hand, the CMC received 3,695 applications from the shelterless in 2015-16. Their fixed target is 600, and for that to be achieved, it is said, the concerned department has marked government land for housing in 76th Badagubettu, Shivalli, Puttur and Herga villages. But no further action was later taken," Venkatesh said.
He added, "A decision was taken in the gram panchayat to distribute houses to 911 eligible beneficiaries. There was a plan of constructing houses with an apartment layout of ground and two floors. This promise by the commissioner was not fulfilled. At the district review meeting, a decision was taken to distribute land in the respective gram panchayats, in case of lack of space for distribution. It should be executed soon.
"There is a 1.90-acre government land identified at Puttur. It was sanctioned by the assistant commissioner of Kundapura, two years ago. But the distribution process of land has not yet started. CMC commissioner Manjunathayya misled the farmers by giving a different statement," Venkatesh said.
Along with this, few other demands were also put forth at the protest meeting.
After receiving a memorandum copy from the protestors, revenue officer P Chandra Poojary informed the media, "The City Municipality council shortlisted 595 beneficiaries and identified 11-acre land at Parkala and Shivalli. By the end of December, the housing sites will be distributed."
Balakrishna Shetty, state secretary of CITU, Kaviraj, secretary of AIAWU, Das Bhandary, Raj Padukone and others were present.
A protest march was organised as part of the protest. The march commenced from Bannaje and ended at the CMC.