The State Government is now in a process to finalise a project for building an airstrip in Malkangiri district. The district administration is planning to set up an airstrip on 13.233 hectares of land, for which the authorities are looking for a suitable patch of land.
Earlier, Executive Engineer of Public Works Department, Malkangiri, had written to the district Collector for acquisition of the required land, following which the district administration approached the Deputy Director General of Forests, the Union Ministry of Environment & Forests. The district administration is planning to launch a massive afforestation drive for the project as part of compensation for using forestland for the commercial purpose. Since forestland would be acquired for the airstrip project, the local tehsildar has been asked to identify land for afforestation on 26.466 acres of land.
The project is likely to get a nod after identification of suitable forestland, which would be converted to the commercial land. As per the order by the Collector, the tehsildar had identified a forestland. However, the Divisional Forest Officer (DFO) rejected it for the infrastructure project.