The New Nation - Internet Edition

Shamim Jahangir

Implementation of the four-year long resetlement plan for affected people in the coal mining areas is uncertain over land price issues at Barapukuria area.

To resolve the land price issue at Barapukuria areas, the Ministry of Power, Energy and Mineral Resources (MoPEMR) will hold an inter-ministerial meeting tomorrow (Thursday).

State Minister for Power and Energy Brig Gen (Retd) Muhammad Enamul Huq will preside over the meeting. Representatives of the ministries of the Communication, Land, Law will atend in the meeting.

The Barapukuria Coal Mining Company Limited (BCMCL) has placed a development project proposal (DPP) at an estimated cost of Tk 324.24 crore to the MoPEMR on December last for extraction of one million ton coal annually.

Under the DPP, the BCMCL has planned to compensate nearly 1,300 affected families to acquire 646 acres of lands in seven villages in Dinajpur in four phases between 2010 and 2013.

The BCMCL fixed per acre of land price at Tk 35 Lakh at Barapukuria following signing of memorandum of understanding (MoU) with affected villagers in May last year. "But actual price of per acre land at Barapukuria is Tk 5 lakh to Tk 6 lakh," a senior official of the MoPEMR said.

He said that the government would pay Tk 226.1crore to acquire 646 acres of land at Barapukuria. "So, approval of the DPP would not be possible before revision of the existing land acquisition law or promulgating ordinance," he informed.

It would need at least six-month to revise of the land law, he added. "Revision of the land acquisition law or promulgate on of ordinance would not be a wise decision for resetlement framework at Barapukuria," he further said.

The BCMCL authorities would compensate Tk 260.76 crore under the first phase in the current fiscal year, the DPP mentioned. "Besides, the authority will also compensate Tk 41.21 crore in 2010-11, Tk 13.13 crore in 2011-12 and Tk 9.12 crore in 2012-13," the DPP said.

BCMCL Managing Director Eng Md Kamruzzaman yesterday told The New Nation, "BCMCL is hopeful to implement the resetlement frame work within a year through promulgating ordinance."

"We can now extract 8.6 lakh tons of coal annually," he said, "After resetlement and development of the coal mining areas, it would increase to 10 lakh tons." The extraction suffered several times in a month as affected villagers laid siege in coal mining areas demanding compensation.

"We have identified 17 categories of affected people under the compensation package," he said, adding that the BCMCL authorities will identify the people in its' final survey which would complete within this month.

He said that the affected villagers would enforce indefinite hunger strike from today (Wednesday).

However, the BCMCL authorities will also acquire additional 80 acres of land to develop a coal mining city in the mining areas. "Each of the affected family will get a free plot of 200 square meters (4.94 decimal) to 400 square meters (9.88 decimal) in accordance with the damage suffered," the DPP said.

A family will also get Tk 1.5 lakh to Tk 7.5 lakh in accordance with their loss, DPP added.

The BCMCL has a reserve of around 389 million tons of coal and the authorities will extract 10 to 20 per cent of the total reserve through underground mining in 30 years.

The authorities have been extracting 3,000 tons of coal against the demand of 1,200 to 1,400 tons of coal daily.