Survey work for POSCO starts amid protest

BHUBANESWAR - A socio-economic survey for a steel plant project by South Korean steel major POSCO in Orissa began Tuesday despite protests, an official said.

A team of officials conducted the survey at Nolia Sahi village in the district of Jagatsinghpur, district collector N.C. Jena told IANS. The survey will continue at the project site for the next 15 days, he said.

During the survey, the officials will identify villagers, count trees and evaluate different crops people grow in the area. The survey will help the administration to decide on the compensation to be paid, he said.

Though the surveyors did not face any protest at the project site, hundreds of activists of the Communist Party of India-Marxist Leninist (CPI-ML) staged a protest at state capital Bhubaneswar opposing the move.

Carrying placards and banners, the activists marched on the streets shouting slogans against the company, a senior police official said.

POSCO, one of the world’s biggest steel makers, signed a deal with the Orissa government in June 2005 to set up the project near the port town of Paradip in Jagatsinghpur, some 100 km from here, by 2016.

The steel maker requires about 4,004 acres for the project, of which 2,900 acres are forest land. The project has been delayed for over three years due to various reasons, including protests by locals.

Thousands of villagers have been protesting the project, saying it will displace them from their homeland and ruin their betel-leaf farms. POSCO and the government maintain the project will bring prosperity and employment to an impoverished region.

There has been no progress on the ground despite the state receiving final clearance from the union forest and environment ministry for acquiring forest land for the project.

Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik last week held a meeting with elected representatives of the area and offered to talk to the anti-POSCO leaders if necessary.

Patnaik also announced that the government will ask the company not to insist on acquiring private land of about 300 acres for its plant, especially in Dhinkia - one of the several villages where the project is facing protests.

Patnaik’s proposals were, however, rejected by the leaders opposed to the project.