Southern States - Tamil Nadu   

Vellore `Autonagar' remains a non-starter

By P.V.V. Murthi

VELLORE Feb. 6 . A 17-year-old proposal to establish an `Autonagar' on the outskirts of Vellore to house automobile workshops, at present occupying space on the Old Bypass Road here, is still hanging fire owing to difficulties faced by the All Workshop Owners Association in obtaining the required land.

A visit to the Old Bypass Road about a year ago would have made one wonder whether it was a road or a large automobile workshop meant for repairing buses and lorries. Though the situation has changed now after warnings issued by the district administration against encroachments and the diversion of Chennai-bound moffusil buses and lorries via this road, it still does not deserve to be called a Bypass Road, which is supposed to be wide enough to facilitate smooth movement of long-distance heavy vehicular traffic.

At any time of the day, one can see defective lorries and buses parked on either side of the road, sometimes two or three lorries being parked next to each other, with mechanics attending to the repairs lying underneath the vehicles. These vehicles virtually encroached on the road space hindering free movement of traffic.

When Daniel Gunanidhi was the Collector of Vellore in 1985, he mooted a proposal to shift the automobile workshops to the outskirts by establishing the `Autonagar'.

K. Manickam, president, All Workshop Owners Association, Vellore, said that in 1992, the association passed a resolution deciding to establish the `Autonagar' and move their workshops to that place. The association sought 35 acres of poromboke land at Pallikonda, but sufficient land was not available. The then Food Minister, G. Viswanathan, requested them to buy a separate land on their own. Consequently, the association purchased 37 acres at Perumugai on the road leading to Chennai. But the land was fragmented.

It, therefore, needed to acquire another four to five acres, owned by seven individuals, in between the fragments to have a composite site.

After the National Highways Authority of India started widening the highway, those land-owners who earlier agreed to give the land at Rs. 2,500 per cent were now demanding Rs. 7,500 per cent.

G. Appa Naidu, vice-president, said the association virtually gave up its attempts to form the `Autonagar' in view of the obstinacy of the land-owners in refusing to reduce the price and since it did not get the required cooperation from the district administration for the last 10 years.

The association would soon be approaching the present Collector for help. He wanted the Government to acquire the required land with the same seriousness with which it was acquiring the land for widening of the national highway.

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