Opposition to the location of Namma Metro’s Cantonment station in a playground used by Abdul Bari’s High School, instead of near the Cantonment Railway Station itself, is likely to increase in the coming days with the Railways on Monday clarifying that they had no problems with allocating land to Bangalore Metro Rail Corporation Limited (BMRCL).

BMRCL had last week published the alignment for the underground section of Reach 6 in Phase II, which had the new location of the Cantonment station within the playground at a distance of almost 1 kilometer from the entrance of the Cantonment Railway Station. At the time, BMRCL had justified the move by stating that land acquisition would be easier.

With the new station located around 250 meters from the end of the railway platform, BMRCL officials had said that they would ensure that easy connectivity was not affected. However, the move still earned the ire of several commuters and groups who said that the station location must not change.

The clarification issued by railways on Monday showed that the South Western Railway had been asked in May 2017 for 16,000 Sq Mtrs of land for a period of four years and permanent licensing of 2500 sq meters near the railway station. “In this connection joint site survey has been proposed in order to identify the exact requirement of land, possibility of its sparing and taking up process for transfer of land there after. The issue is under discussion and will be finalized after feasibility study and mutual dialogue between South Western Railway and BMRCL,” a statement by Indian Railways said.

According to the railways, it was open to considering any proposal of sparing land for BMRCL to facilitate metro work in a way to make it beneficial to everybody.