Dera Baba Nanak (Punjab): While the central and Punjab governments have been blaming each other for the delay in executing the work related to the Katarpur Corridor project on the Indian side, residents of villages whose land will be acquired for the religiously significant project are apprehensive about their fate — that of being uprooted from the land where they have lived for decades.

While the villagers clearly welcome the project and are quite willing to offer their land for it, their apprehension is about the compensation they will receive and whether it be adequate form them to resettle elsewhere.

The villagers have formed a committee of four villages in which the land is proposed to be acquired, as per the land acquisition notice issued by the government over the past week, to put forward their common demands on compensation and resettlement.

At a committee meeting, in which local farmers, residents and even functionaries of farmers’ organisations participated earlier this week in the presence of a visiting IANS correspondent, it was pointed out that over 200 families will be uprooted in the next three months as the government goes ahead with land acquisitions related to the corridor project.

The international border is just a few hundred metres from the area where the National Highway Authority of India (NHAI) has proposed the highway for the project. Red flags have been put up in the agricultural fields by NHAI officials to mark where the proposed highway will pass through.

“As per the rough estimates, nearly 300 acres of land will be acquired for the corridor project. Out of this, 54 acres will be required for the highway alone,” Gurpreet Singh, a farmer and resident of Pakhoke village on the outskirts of Dera Baba Nanak (DBN) town, told IANS.

The most affected villages are Pakhoke, Chandu Nangal, Dera Baba Nanak (DBN) and Jodiyan Khurd.

Farmers say that the DBN belt is well-known for cauliflower farming and the land acquisitions will rob farmers of their livelihood.

“The farmers welcome the Kartarpur Corridor project. This is a very big thing happening and has matured after a very long time and lot of efforts. We don’t want to stop the acquisition process. Our concern is how will the government compensate and rehabilitate us,” another farmer, Suba Singh, pointed out.

The committee of farmers is scheduled to meet the Gurdaspur Deputy Commissioner on Monday, January 28 to discuss the land acquisitions.

“Each farmer makes around Rs200,000 [Dh10,347] per year from growing cauliflower. This income will go once the land is acquired. The government should compensate the farmers not only for the market price of the land but also for the loss of income from agriculture,” farmer Joginder Singh said.

Most farmers in the area have small land holdings of 2-5 acres and survive on growing different crops, including cauliflower.

With the central and Punjab governments under pressure to complete the corridor project in Punjab before November, when the 550th birth anniversary celebrations of Guru Nanak Dev, the founder of Sikhism, take place, the whole DBN area is all set for a major transformation.

The first batch of pilgrims from India headed to the Kartarpur Sahib gurdwara, where Guru Nanak spent the last 18 years of his life and which also serves as his final resting place, is likely to cross the border into Pakistan in November this year as both countries work out the travel modalities.

The gurdwara, which is significant for Sikh religious history and is visible from the India side on a clear day, is located around 4.5km from the border with Pakistan.