Just a day before the second phase of the general elections for both assembly and Lok Sabha seats in the coastal belt of Orissa is slated, it?s all quite at Jagatsighpur, located about 100 km from Bhubaneswar. That?s the proposed site for building a $12-billion steel plant by South Korea?s steel major Posco with the biggest-ever greenfield foreign direct investment in the country.
The company, which signed a memorandum of understanding with the Orissa government in 2005 to set up a 4 million-tonne capacity steel plant near Paradip, at Jagatsinghpur district in coastal Orissa, is yet to start work, thanks to stiff resistance from local people against land acquisition. What makes the situation tricky is the seat sharing alliance that the ruling Biju Janata Dal has with the left parties and it is the Communist Party of India (CPI) that was most vocal in its opposition to the Posco plant since beginning.
On the fact of it, land acquisition for the Posco plant does not seem like a gigantic task, as out of the required 4,004 acres of land for the project, only 438 acres were private land and the rest belonged to the state government. On ground, however, the situation is tense. More than 5,000 people living in Dhinkia, Nuagan and Gobindpur villages in Jagarsinghpur district have refused to take compensation for the land. For years now, they have been cultivating paddy, pan (betel leaf) etc in the land that belongs to government. And they are opposing the entry of any political party into their village.
?We would not give up this fertile land that the villagers have been cultivating for decades,? said Prashant Paikray, spokesperson, Posco Pratirodh Sangram Samiti, an anti-Posco group with members from CPI, CPM and other parties.
Given the violent protest against land acquisition, the parties canvassing for the elections have refrained from talking about Posco. Instead, they are talking about providing rice at cheaper rates, about the development of rural industries and of awarding mining rights to only state-owned companies such as Orissa Mining Corporation and others.
In fact, many industry leaders in this state capital that FE spoke to agreed that the state government should have been more sensitive in handling the protests against land acquisition. ?There is need for a sustained interface between the local people, the state government and the industry prior to land acquisition, so that people at large understand the positive impact of industrialisation,? Sharad S Nandurdikar, managing director, Paradeep Phosphates, and also chairman, Confederation of Indian Industry, Orissa chapter, said.
Meanwhile, Posco officials are in a wait-and-watch mode. A company official, who did not wish to be identified in our report, said the company is ?waiting for the elections to be over before pursuing it with the state government?.
Although the CPI has fielded its candidate from Jagatsinghpur, it continues to oppose the Posco plant stating that foreign companies cannot be allowed ?to exploit the natural and mineral resources of the state for profit, at the expense of the interest of villagers?. CPI general secretary AB Bardhan, after concluding a seat sharing agreement with BJD recently, said, ?Our stand on Posco continues as before and the party will not mortgage its struggles and ideology.?
The Jagatsinghpur parliament seat, which was a general seat earlier, has been reserved for the schedule caste category. After delimitation of the assembly constituencies, this seat consists of seven assembly constituencies?Ersama-Balikuda, Jagatsinghpur, Paradip, Tirtol of Jagatsinghpur district, Nilali of Cuttack district and Kakatpur and Nimapara of Puri district.