After green nod, Posco stares at red signal on land buy

Having got the green nod from the Union Environment Ministry for its mega plant in Orissa, South Korean steel major Posco will now be bracing for the next big challenge for its $12-billion project -- land acquisition.

Land acquisition has been a sensitive and thorny issue in the mineral-rich state, where domestic steel giant Tata Steel is still struggling to get adequate land for its project announced nearly seven years ago.

"The real protest will start now. We will decide the future course of our democratic struggle against the Korean project soon," Posco Pratirodh Sangram Samiti (PPSS) spokesperson Prashant Paikary told PTI over phone.

"It is a matter of concern that both the Centre and state governments have deliberately overlooked the important issues raised by us on the illegalities committed in the forest and environment clearance process," the anti-displacement group's spokesperson said.

The Environment Ministry last week gave final clearance to the 12-million tonne (MT) steel plant to be set by Posco in Jagatsinghpur district.

The $12-billion integrated steel, mining and port project in Orissa is the single largest foreign investment in India. The South Korean firm had signed an MoU for the project with the Orissa government in 2005.

"Both the Centre and state have sacrificed everything for the sake of the project. Local people very much understood the real motive of the government," Praffula Samantra, a green activist and head of Loksakti Abhijan, a local group, said.