KOCHI: The State government is expected to issue orders for acquiring land for the Kochi Metro Rail project within two days, Kochi Metro Rail Ltd (KMRL) Managing Director Tom Jose said here on Thursday. A total of 32 hectares of land will be acquired as per the estimate, 292 building structures from seven villages will have to be evacuated. The total cost of land acquisition is estimated at Rs 600-Rs 700 crore.“A special meeting will be convened by the District Collector on November 15 to sort out the issues related to land acquisition. Some people in the Vyttila-Pettah stretch had protested against the land acquisition when the members of the special unit formed for land acquisition visited the place the other day. “We are trying to avoid such situations and the meeting is expected to clear the apprehensions of 17 persons who were against the acquisition,” Tom Jose said.Jose said that KMRL was planning to dismantle the spans of the North Rail Overbridge (RoB) by next week. “The Southern Railways has given us sanction to dismantle the spans over the track. We have instructed the contractor to demolish the spans and work is expected to be completed by next week,” he said.Though the dismantling of both the motor bays of the North RoB had begun, the spans over the tracks were not demolished as the Railways had not given the necessary permission. A special railway safety team inspected the site last week and based on their report, the sanction has been given. However, the railway authorities made it clear that the present sanction is only for dismantling the spans and KMRL will have to get separate sanction for construction work over the tracks. They also said that power supply would be blocked and the trains would be re-routed when the dismantling of the spans begin.
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