OUR CORRESPONDENT
TINSUKIA: The affected families of Baghjan blowout lifted their indefinite oil blockade on Thursday following bipartite negotiation with Oil India Limited (OIL) at OIL Headquarters in Duliajan.
The residents had been resorting to the stir since Tuesday. After the compensation issue was disposed off by the National Green Tribunal (NGT), the activists of 'Baghjan Gaon Milanjyoti Yuva Sangha' (BGMYS) were left in despair.
The blockade has been lifted on the condition that certain adjustments would be made after the Tinsukia district administration submits its final field-survey report which is at the completion stage.
Mentionably, apart from the actual victims of Baghjan several pressure groups backed by students' organizations and political lobbies attempted to squeeze OIL for money on compensation plea. However during the initial days of blowout, they succeeded in making the district officials carry out preliminary survey works at the affected areas. The then district administration got some areas, including Limbuguri Tea Estate, surveyed merely on the basis of speculation, though none of these areas were affected and fit for any compensation, informed an official source. After the NGT verdict, these organizations resurfaced after a brief lull leaving the OIL on tenterhooks.
According to OIL records, after having accepted the liability of 600 affected families, it paid Rs. 15 lakh to each of 161 families and Rs 10 lakh to each of 439 families; which ran to about Rs 68 crore.
It had earlier paid Rs 30,000 each to 3,000 persons i.e., Rs. 9 crore; and Rs. 12 lakh each to 11 families i.e., Rs 2.2 crore. Further, an amount of Rs 50,000 each was paid to the families who had left the relief camps to meet their respective costs of rent, food etc. According to OIL, it has spent about Rs 11 crore on the camps and also incurred expenditure on managing the blowout which was about Rs 151 crore.
Nevertheless, BGMYS activists are demanding the compensation amount as suggested by Justice BP Katakey to the NGT. It is Rs 25 lakh in category-I and Rs 20 lakh in category-II. But, the NGT has declined to accept the demand.
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