Tata hold public hearing in Ganjam

… Public demand for mega steel project in the land

Berhampur: Much discussed and awaited Tata’s public hearing finally held at Chamakhandi near Chatrapur to discuss with the public about the environment clearance of its proposed project near Gopalpur on Tuesday. There was no such highlighted discussion on environment problem after the set up of the industry, whereas most of the representatives of the people were talked about mega steel plant, employment, displacement problems and other things, though the hearing was for environment clearance.

The meeting started from hue and cry between some groups after ex-MLA of Gopalpur Dr Trinath Behera’s opinion regarding support for mega steel plant and compensation for the displacement family. The meeting started from hearing to the people’s representatives and political leaders. They kept their opinion on this matter. They are ex-MLA of Gopalpur Dr Trinath Behera, ex-chairman of Chatrapur NAC Ramachandra Behera, Trilochan Behera, Kamraju Verma, Ramesh Chandra Mahankuda, Ramesh Chandra Jena, Uma Shankar Sahu, Zilla Parishad member Kailash Palei, Gorachand Bhattamishra, Girijaprasad Reddy, Bibhuti Jena, Biswanath Sahu,  Chatrapur MLA Adikanda Sethi, Berhampur MP Sidhanta Mahapatra were talked from different angles of public hearing.

While Tata officials told that they will set up three industries on the acquired land of 450 acres. First, a high carbon ferrochrome industry of which production capacity will 5,500 tonne per year and the raw material will be imported  from Jamshedpur, Re-bar mill having the production capacity of 4 lakh tonne per year and desalination plant over 450 acres of the acquired land. It will invest 30 crore for environmental protection. They also informed that the estimated cost of the plants is around 800 crore were scheduled to start production by 2013. They also told that the project is for common people only.

“For the betterment of our people, the company should bring a separate project by which the displacement people pertly or full will get benefit out of it”, said Berhampur MP Sidhanta Mahapatra.

One ex-Sarapanch Rajendra Jena told that Tata acquired the land in very low cost. If it acquired the land, it should start the proposed mega steel plant otherwise give full compensation for the land according to the market rate. Otherwise we will not give chance to Tata for industrialization here and on the coming days we will break the boundary wall of Tata.

The Ganjam District Congress Committee (GDCC) alleged that Tata had acquired 3700 acre Government and private land to set up a big steel project but the company derailed from its commitment and now it is planning for an Industrial park and re-rolling mill. Before, the company was talking about the investment of 10,000 crore which is decreased to 1,000 crore now. Due to this land acquisition, thousands of families were in distress by loosing their cultivable land of thousands of crores in market value.