Moolamppilly package: revenue officials dismiss need for monthly meetings

Not having convened a single meeting of the Moolampilly Package Monitoring Committee (MPMC) in the last nearly six months, revenue officials now claim that there was never a decision to hold monthly meetings — despite minutes of multiple meetings stating otherwise — much to the chagrin of families evicted for the rail and road connectivity of the Vallarpadam International Container Transshipment Terminal.

The minutes of a meeting of the MPMC held as recently as July 21, 2025, suggest holding monthly meetings, while the minutes of another meeting chaired by former Chief Minister Oommen Chandy, as far back as 2011, also suggest the same for reviewing the implementation of the rehabilitation package.

“We have received no response from the State government on major demands raised at the last meeting, including the issuance of evictee cards and jobs for one member of each displaced family. These are matters beyond our authority, and without clarity from the government, monthly meetings are meaningless,” a senior official said when asked about the failure to hold monthly meetings since last August.

The Moolampilly Coordination Committee (MCC), which continues to lead the fight for rehabilitation and compensation, said the last meeting on August 22, 2025, was held exactly a month after the previous meeting to dismiss the claim as baseless. It was decided that the Deputy Collector (Land Revenue) would deputise the District Collector in view of the Collector’s busy schedule.

“Official apathy is due to the absence of political will. The failure to share even the minutes of the last meeting held in August exemplifies official indifference,” said Francis Kalathungal, general convener of the MCC.

Eighteen years since their eviction, 316 families across seven villages remain abandoned without rehabilitation, with 41 already dead waiting for justice.

“Photo-affixed evictee cards, promised as far back as 2018, remain unissued despite the MCC submitting the beneficiary list. Likewise, our proposal to use dredged soil from the Cochin Port Authority to strengthen rehabilitation plots in Thuthiyoor and Mulavukad has been ignored, with the soil instead diverted for national highway works,” Mr. Kalathungal said.

The Kerala High Court, in an interim verdict, had ordered that a rehabilitation plot at Thuthiyoor allotted to 56 families be filled and a retaining wall built to fortify it. While the retaining wall has been built, land filling has been a non-starter, meaning only three families have built houses there.

Going further back, the High Court, in its July 4, 2008, verdict, had ordered that rehabilitation plots be made fit for two-storey houses and, until then, beneficiaries be paid a monthly rent of ₹5,000. Both directions stand violated. Most families could not build houses owing to the marshy nature of the plots, a fact confirmed by the Public Works department, while the payment of rent ceased years ago.