The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has agreed to build its proposed space education centre on the new piece of land the Kerala government has offered for free after a controversy over the plot of land the space agency had bought from a businessman. G Madhavan Nair, chairman of ISRO, said in a letter to Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan on Friday that the agency had no problems with the 100-acre of land near Ponmudi hills offered to it.

ISRO had purchased 82 acres of land at the Ponmudi hills, 70 km from here, from Savy Mano Mathew, a high-profile businessman, in March. The opposition parties in the state then alleged that the land belongs to the state government's forest department and Mathew sold it illegally in connivance with Forest Minister Binoy Viswom.

Law Minister M. Vijayakumar told reporters on Saturday that the plot of land belonged to the revenue department. “There is no problem with the title of the new land that we have offered to ISRO. If the organisation has any doubt, the state government will clear it. All the necessary infrastructure would be created by the government and handed over to ISRO,” he added.