Bowbazar residents in Kolkata hold sit-in over damaged houses from East-West metro tunnelling

Kolkata, Aug 22 (PTI) Over 200 residents of Bowbazar in north Kolkata, whose houses were damaged in repeated subsidence incidents during East-West Metro tunnelling since 2019, on Friday staged a sit-in alleging neglect by the authorities.

Local Trinamool Congress councillor Biswarup Dey said several old houses along Durga Pituri Lane in the Esplanade-Sealdah stretch had developed "huge cracks", forcing many families to live in rented accommodations or with relatives for the past six years.

"While Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated three new stretches — including Esplanade-Sealdah — most of us will continue to live outside our ancestral homes due to the apathy and indifference of the Railways. Can anyone say how long we will have to live in rented apartments? What is our fault?" asked Sourav Mukherjee, a member of an affected family, during the protest near B B Ganguly Street.

An official said the Kolkata Metro Railway Corporation Ltd (KMRCL) will soon float tenders for rebuilding and renovating the affected houses, with clearance already obtained from the Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) building department.

Raising the issue at the KMC session, Dey said residents of the affected pockets were "facing extreme difficulties and staring at an uncertain future due to the inordinate delay" by Metro Railways.

Modi inaugurated three new metro routes in Kolkata, including the first-ever direct link to the Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose International Airport here.

The 13.61 km-long network, spread across the ‘Green’, ‘Yellow ‘and ‘Orange’ lines, marks a defining moment in the city’s metro journey that began in 1984. PTI SUS MNB