Uttar Pradesh Congress Committee president Salman Khurshid on Sunday termed the agreement between Reliance Energy and the Mulayam Singh Yadav government as a "sell-out".
At a press conference in Lucknow, Khurshid distributed copies of the agreement that had been kept under wraps so far. Signed on June 24, 2004, by then UP chief secretary V K Mittal and Reliance Energy CEO Satish Seth, the agreement was alleged to be highly tilted in favour of Reliance Energy, controlled by Anil Ambani, enjoying close proximity to the ruling Samajwadi Party.
"The Mulayam Singh Yadav government went out of its way to extend special favours to Reliance Energy for setting up a gas-based mega power project in Dadri, bordering New Delhi, even at the cost of causing colossal loss to the state exchequer, besides sacrificing interest of the poor farmer," he alleged.
"The powerful company was not only provided a huge chunk of land, far disproportionate to the actual requirement for the proposed mega power project, but also allowed to commercially exploit the land," he pointed out.
According to the terms of the agreement, Reliance Energy was entitled to 2,500 acres of land on a 100-year lease at a paltry annual rent of just Rs 100 per acre. "Most of the conditions laid out in the agreement were one sided; and while it bound the UP government to fulfil several conditions within a time-bound frame, there was no reciprocal binding on the company," he said.
"Just imagine, the UP government undertook responsibility of handing over 2,500 acres of land to the company within a period of 120 days, without a concurrent binding for generation of power within a time-frame," he added.
As per Clause 4.5 (a) of the agreement, "The government of UP shall at the earliest possible but not later than 365 days from the date of signing this agreement, set up and establish all connected infrastructure links with the site including roads, bridges, adequate to meet the project requirements ."
Expressing deep concern over the UP government's "virtual surrender" before Reliance energy, Khurshid said, "As if all the favours were not enough, Mulayam Singh Yadav also decided to grant them total exemption of stamp duty too."
"On the other hand, the government denied adequate compensation to the farmer whose land was acquired for the purpose," Khurshid said.
"We procured a copy of the agreement only after moving an application under the Right to Information Act, otherwise our repeated plea for the document fell on deaf ears," Khurshid further disclosed.
According to him, "Even when the issue was raised in the state assembly, the speaker only agreed to make it available for perusal in his chamber and declined to direct the government to table it in the House for debate."
"Well, now that we have the copy, we will make it public so that people can see for themselves how the UP government was sacrificing the interest of the common man to extend all kinds of favours to an industrialist," Khurshid added.
Reacting sharply to the move, Samajwadi Party spokesman Beni Prasad Verma reiterated their stance of blaming the Congress party for the delay in setting up of the project.
"If the Congress-controlled Union Petroleum Ministry had not created hurdles in making the required gas available for the project, it would have been commissioned by now; but this only reflects the prejudiced attitude of the Congress that was responsible for retarding the state's development," Prasad said.
