Residents of 13 villages, including Parandur in Kancheepuram district on Sunday took a pledge to make an all-out effort to prevent the proposed airport from coming up in their area. Recently, gram sabhas, including those in Ekanapuram, Gunagarambakkam and Parandur, had passed resolutions against the proposal for the airport.
D. Hariparanthaman, former Judge of Madras High Court, who addressed the residents, suggested that the government could look at expanding the existing airport by using the land belonging to the Officers’ Training Academy (OTA).
Viable alternatives
The Centre and the State government should also think of developing existing airstrips in other parts of the State into airports, which would help decongest the city airport.
This was imperative since only about 20% of airport users were from Chennai city, the rest being from other parts of the State. Non-governmental organisation Poovulagin Nanbargal’s G. Sundarrajan, who urged Chief Minister M.K. Stalin to drop the plan, said the plan would only lead to floods in the city.
Nearly 4,000 waterbodies surrounding the city need to be desilted.
‘Canal will be affected’
If the airport were to come up, the Kamban Canal would be affected. He said the village of Ekanapuram, which would give 650 acres of land, 610 houses and several waterbodies and canals, would be completely wiped off the map if this project were to come to fruition.
