Sandra Rodrigues says her family has been left ‘land-locked’. A 51-year-old resident of Velsao in South Goa’s Mormugao taluka, Rodrigues lives in a 400-year-old heritage house facing a railway track.

Her ancestral home was built long before the railways arrived in the area in the late 19th century. But now, with the ongoing double-tracking project, mud, soil and other construction material have been dumped near her house by the South Western Railway (SWR) contractor, blocking the traditional motorable access road [Level Crossing 26] and the family’s right of way, she says. As a result, she has to “trespass” on a neighbour’s property to leave her house.…