By IANS
Thiruvananthapuram : The land belonging to Tata group firm Tata Tea in Munnar in excess of permissible limits will be recovered within two weeks, Kerala Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan told the state assembly Wednesday.
"We are committed to recovering the excess land from the Tatas. Work in this regard is progressing and it would be completed in two weeks," he said.
Achuthanandan was replying to the opposition's allegations that he was delaying action and been making promises for the past one year.
Munnar, a picturesque hill town in Idukki known for its tea estates, was bought by J.D. Munroe, a British national, from the Poonjar royal family near Kottayam in a permanent and perpetual grant in 1877.
In 1895, it was bought over by a British company, James Finlay & Co, which held it till 1977 when Kerala took over the land under the Land Reforms Act and the Kannan Devan Hills Resumption Land Act.
After keeping 70,522 acres, the government gave the remaining 57,359.14 acres to Tata Finlay Ltd, which was acquired by Tata Tea in 1983.
However, the Kannan Devan Hills Resumption Land Act provides for an upper limit of 50,000 acres on private land holding.
After visiting Munnar, Achuthanandan as leader of opposition (2001-06) had maintained that the state government must take back the land over which the company had no right.
The state government had recently asked the Hyderabad-based National Remote Sensing Agency to conduct an aerial survey of Munnar to find out the extent of Tatas' land holding.
The state government in expected to go ahead with land recovery after studying the agency's report.
The move would be part of Achuthanandan's efforts to evict all encroachers in the tourist town of Munnar. In the campaign that started last month, more than 10,000 acres of land has been recovered.