Minister of State V Muralitharan on Saturday said development could take place without evicting or displacing so many people as he had met and contacted people affected by the Silverline project in Thiruvananthapuram.
Silverline is the proposed semi-high speed rail corridor between Thiruvananthapuram and Kasaragod and is expected to reach from one end to the other within four hours.
After the conversation, Muralitharan told CNN-News18, “Many of these houses are newly built, people have saved all their money, their lives. When they are suddenly evicted, they have no place to go. People are scared, they don’t know what their future holds. “
The minister further said that he was in favor of development, but it was possible to do so without displacing so many people.
“I am convinced that development can happen without so many people being evicted and displaced. Why is the state government urging the people to evict? He asked.
MoS says after meeting Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the Kerala Chief Minister has suggested that he should meet the Railway Minister.
Muralitharan said, “On the same day on the floor of Parliament, the Railway Minister said that the project is now an environmental disaster.”
The Minister further added that no such geotechnical research has been done so far and the detailed project report would have been meaningless without such research.
The minister added, “Kerala may have Bande Bharat train and with this we can reach from one end of Kerala to the other in three and a half hours. Of course, a technical upgrade is needed. “
The minister denied all allegations in Congress that there was a “compromise” between the Left and the BJP over the project.
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