Residents of Ward 28 in Saravanampatti have petitioned the District Collector Archana Patnaik on Monday seeking the removal of encroachment from public pathway.

In their petition, the residents have stated that they have been using the pathway near a farmland in Buvaneshwari Nagar for 20 years. The road is a public pathway according to a map given by the Revenue Department.

“We moved into the neighbourhood after buying plots and have been using a bullock cart pathway. The owner of the farmland adjacent to the road tried to encroach the land by blocking the road,” said K. Krishanan, one of the residents. “When we tried to approach the Assistant Commissioner of North Zone, the owner put up steel fence to block the road. We request the Collector to clear the encroachments and make the road accessible for us,” he said.