Posco-India may have got the approval to clear forest land for its 12 million tonne steel plant in Orissa?s Jagatsinghpur district, and save its special economic zone status but it won?t be easy to get the land in hand. The 2,958.79 acre forest land is now covered with thousands of betel leaf vineyards and the company will have to pay huge amounts of compensation for removal of the vineyards.
As per the socio-economic survey conducted by the Xavier Institute of Management, Bhubaneswar (XIMB) two years ago, there were 1,973 vineyards in an area of 392.15 acre. Taking the survey into consideration, Posco in its rehabilitation action plan announced that the farmers would be compensated at the rate of Rs 6 lakh per acre of betel farms, besides rehabilitation.
Ever since the Posco offer has leaked, villagers in the project site areas have raised betel vines in the forest land in hope of compensation. The Posco Pratirodha Sangrama Samiti (PPSS), which is spearheading a fierce resistance movement against the project, is encouraging villagers to take up betel cultivation in government and forest land.
According to a rough estimation, there are now about 5,000 betel vineyards in the forest land that comes under the Posco project site.
The company was earlier supposed to pay Rs 23.52 crore as compensation for the vineyards as per the Special Resettlement and Rehabilitation Policy of the Orissa government. However, it will now have to pay much more to clear the forest.
?We have drawn the attention of the district administration towards this phenomenon,? said a Posco spokesperson. As per the norms, the completion of the socio-economic survey would be taken as a cut-off date for the payment of the compensation, he said. The company management and the district administration may be thinking on these lines, but this issue is far from over. While Posco-India has got approval to clear forest land, it can only save the SEZ status after it gets the Centre?s nod to acquire forest land. The company had almost lost the SEZ status because of the delay in land acquisition. Now, with the forest clearances coming in, the process of land acquisition for the project is expected to start soon.
Posco-India has proposed to develop a multi-product SEZ with its 12 mt steel project as anchor tenant over an area of 1,620.496 hectare. The ministry of environment and forest last week accorded the stage-II forest clearance allowing the state government to divert forest land for industry.