Even as it comes to terms with the land acquisition controversy in Nandigram and Singur, the CPI(M)-led West Bengal government has handed over the order for possession of 4,300 acres at Salboni in West Medinipur to Sajjan Jindal-controlled JSW Steel for a 10 million tonnes a year steel plant.
Biswadip Gupta, joint managing director and chief executive officer, JSW Bengal Steel, said the order arrived on Friday.
Nandigram, in East Medinipur, saw violent protests from villagers who were losing land to the proposed 22,000 acre chemical hub and multi-product SEZ of the Indonesia-based Salim group. Till now, around 22 people have lost lives on account of the protests, even after the government has declared that the project would be shifted.
The situation in Singur (40 km from Kolkata), the 997-acre site for the Tata Motors' small car project and vendor park, was also mired in controversy over land acquisition. However, the situation now appears to be normalising as work is in full progress and the first Tata car is expected to roll out from there in March 2008.
The order excludes the 560-570 acres of land for which JSW is directly negotiating with the villagers. Gupta said the villagers had agreed to hand over their land.
According to Gupta, the land, which the company is planning to acquire on its own, is the source of income for around 741 families. The company has assured the villagers that they would be compensated for their livelihoods. Only potato is cultivated on the land.
The project would also leave out the 80 acres of forest land in the area, which had been identified in a survey after the project had been finalised.
Gupta, however, refused to divulge the price at which the government was offering the land or the company would pay to the villagers. However, the maximum that the company would have to pay for the land was around Rs 100 crore (Rs 1 billion), which was 1 per cent of the project cost of Rs 10,000 crore (Rs 100 billion) in the first phase.
Sajjan Jindal, vice-chairman and managing director of JSW Steel, is expected to meet West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee later this month to discuss the progress of the project and finalise the price the 4,300 acres of land.
In the first phase of the project, the company plans to put up a facility of three million tonne. It would be subsequently ramped up to 10 million tonne at a total project cost of Rs 35,000 crore (Rs 350 billion).
Gupta said that the company was now in the process of tying the iron ore linkages and coal requirements for the project. The project would buy iron fines from the market for the project.
For coal, the company would revive two closed blocks in Kulti. Three coking coal blocks and one non-coking coal block had been assured for the project.
The project would be implemented through a special purpose vehicle, which will have an initial paid-up and authorised capital of Rs 100 crore. The JSW group holds 89 per cent in the SPV, while the balance is held by the West Bengal Industrial and Development Corporation and the West Bengal Mineral Development and Trading Corporation.
