Political parties oppose Posco land acquisition

Political parties opposing the land acquisition for Posco steel plant in Jagatsinghpur district of Orissa have once again raised their voice against the project after the company has got the final forest clearance from the Central government to buy land.

Terming the final nod as 'violation' of Forest Act 2006, the parties submitted a memorandum to the state governor seeking his intervention to stop 'any attempt to acquire land in the proposed site'.

The Left parties, Rastriya Janata Dal and Samajwadi Party members staged a Dharna in front of Raj Bhawan today and submitted the memorandum, suggesting Posco should set up its plant in a barren land and not in a fertile area.

The parties maintained that nearly three fourth of the proposed 4,004 acre land belongs to forest area and said the soil is fertile for crops like paddy, cashew nut, coconut, banana, cereals and pulses. However, according to the reports of two Central government committees, people mostly cultivated betel leaves there. The committees recommended that they may be treated as other traditional forest dwellers as their livelihood depended on this forest land.

The state government did not agree with the suggestion of the committees and sent a report to the Central government saying the people living in the said area can not be treated as forest dwellers since, as per the government records, they were not using the land for past 75 years, mandatory to be considered as other traditional forest dwellers.

The Union Ministry of Environment and Forest (MoEF), which slow-walked over the issue for almost half a decade, gave its final clearance to the Posco project on May 2. The state government promptly reacted to the recommendation and decided the land acquisition for the project would start from May 18.