Land buying for Posco to be completed in a week

The state government has already acquired 2,000 acres of land for the Posco project

Moving ahead with its land acquisition spree for the Posco project, the Jagatsinghpur district administration plans to complete acquisition of 700 more acres of land for the mega steel plant in a week.

The state government has already acquired 2,000 acres for the project. In the current phase of land procurement, an additional 700 acres were to be acquired. This is necessary since Posco had sought at least 2,700 acres to start construction of an eight million tonne per annum (mtpa) steel mill in the first phase. The capacity will be ramped up to full committed level of 12 million tonne as and when the rest of the required 4,004 acres land is acquired.

“We expect to complete acquisition of 700 acres land for the Posco project in a week. Close to 600 acres have been acquired. Trenching work for boundary wall construction is also going on at Gobindpur,” said Jagatsinghpur collector Satya Kumar Mallick.

It may be noted, during the visit of Korean Ambassador, Kim Joong Keoun and his meeting with chief minister Naveen Patnaik at Bhubaneswar on March 6, the state government had assured to complete the land acquisition process for the first phase of the project within 2-3 months. Asked if protests at the project site would impede land acquisition, “The protests would not impact land acquisition since we hope to resolve all issues amicably through discussions.”

Recently, the land acquisition drive for the Posco project had suffered a setback when villagers opposed it, alleging massive irregularities in measurement of vines.

The affected people also objected to starting trench cutting work for building the boundary wall since the environment clearance of the project is yet to get the validation of the Green Tribunal and matter is still pending with the Union Ministry of Environment and Forest (MoEF).

The pro-Posco villagers also alleged that the company authorities and officials of Odisha Industrial Infrastructure Development Corporation (Idco) have started trench cutting process for erection of boundary wall for the project without finalising compensation, fixation of land rate, job opportunities, identification of betel vine labourers and other issues.

In a recent status note prepared on the Posco project, the state government said it has already handed over 546 acres to Posco India. An additional 1,554 acres were ready to be handed over to the company.

Posco India needed 4,004 acres of land in all. The land was to be acquired in eight villages – Nuagaon, Dhinkia, Noliasahi, Gobindpur, Polang, Bayanalkandha, Bhuyanpal and Jatadhar.

The state government admitted that law and order problems at the project site and delay in obtaining approval of forest diversion from the Union ministry of environment & forest (MoEF) impeded progress in project implementation.