LANDING IN TROUBLE Bs Reporter / Kolkata August 22, 2008, 1:02 IST In a new twist to the controversy surrounding the 997-acre plot for the Nano car plant of Tata Motors at Singur, 40 km west of Kolkata, the Trinamool Congress (TC) controlled gram panchayat in the area said it would not grant any permission to the plant, like environmental and water-use licences, and also threatened to take action against the company as its factory was blocking the rainwater drainage channel of the entire area. "The factory is blocking the age-old water drainage routes of the area, like the Julkia and Kana channels, and villages outside the site are getting flooded. If necessary, the panchayat will go to the factory site and excavate and deepen the channel to its original width and depth. It appears to have been blocked,' warned Singur panchayat leader Becharam Manna of TC. In fact, the West Bengal government has promised Tata Motors to deepen and excavate the channels after the site was flooded in September 2008. Because of the flooding, the company had to raise the plinth level of the entire factory by more than 1 metre to prevent flooding in the future. The situation escalated in the evening after Tata Motors Chairman Ratan Tata reached Kolkata ahead of the Tata Tea annual general meeting in the city on August 22. Tata checked in at Taj Bengal hotel where he met various visitors through the day, including West Bengal Industries Minister Nirupam Sen. "Tata has no intention of pulling out of Singur unless forced to do so. I have tried to assure him and Trinamul has also promised him it would stage a peaceful agitation and there would be no lawlessness on August 24,' Sen said after the meeting. "Tata is very worried and expressed anxiety about what would happen. He did not anticipate this and expected the project would be welcomed in West Bengal,' Sen added. Earlier in the day, TC chief Mamata Banerjee said she would go ahead with the indefinite dharna near the Tata Motors plant from August 24, but was open to dialogue. She claimed her party had already offered to the state government a solution for return of the 400 acres at Singur to "unwilling' farmers. Banerjee offered, "Let the company take whatever land it wants for its 600 acre factory and only after that will the farmers who have not accepted compensation take back their land. I am not insisting on return of the exact land'. Saying that she was not against any compromise, she added, "I am not against the company. The government must accept in-principle the return of land to unwilling farmers and I will show it how and where.' Banerjee confirmed that the Trinamool-run Singur Panchayat Samiti had decided not to extend any facility to the Tata Motors plant. After denying throughout the day that he was going to meet Ratan Tata, state industries secretary Sabyasachi Sen also turned up at Tata's hotel in the evening. Asked if there was any scope for her meeting Tata group Chairman Ratan Tata during his visit to the city tomorrow, Banerjee replied, "I am not an employee of the Tata company."