Land for power lines: HC asks rights body to serve PIL to Adani Power

Kolkata: The Calcutta High Court on Tuesday asked APDR to serve a copy of its public interest litigation (PIL) to Adani Power Ltd, where the rights body alleged that power transmission towers of the company in West Bengal's Farakka were constructed without paying due compensation for land.

The lawyer for Adani Power, who was present in the court, claimed that the project's work for setting up the transmission lines for the export of electricity from its plant at Godda in Jharkhand to Bangladesh started in 2018.

Anuj Singh, the lawyer for the company, submitted before the court that it has not yet received a copy of the petition from APDR (Association for Protection of Democratic Rights).

A division bench comprising Chief Justice Prakash Shrivastava and Justice R Bharadwaj directed the petitioner to serve a copy of the petition to the company and fixed February 20 for the hearing of the case.

The petitioner's lawyer claimed that around 35 owners of mango and lychee orchards suffered loss of livelihoods owing to the setting up of the towers, alleging that they have not been given compensation for the land taken from them for the purpose.

They also alleged that many mango and lychee trees were felled but the owners were not compensated for that as well.

The company's lawyer claimed that the compensation offered was disputed and refused by the land owners and as such, they should have approached the district magistrate of Murshidabad, where Farakka is located, for adjudication.