The Orissa governments rehabilitation panel looking into the issue of relief for thousands of people to be displaced by the proposed Posco steel plant in Jagatsinghpur district on Thursday announced a comprehensive compensation package to set the stalled project rolling. But within hours,hopes of smooth work crashed as the group spearheading the agitation against the Rs 52,000 crore steel plant complex to be set up the South Korean steelmaker rejected the package. The Rehabilitation and Peripheral Development Advisory Committee of Jagatsinghpur,which met in the evening to finalise the relief package for the 1,718 displaced families,announced Posco would pay the betel vine owners Rs 11.5 lakh per acre. The labourers working in the betel vines would get 20 per cent of the relief awarded to the owners,and unemployment allowance of Rs 2,250 a month for a year,in case they dont get work during the steel plant construction. For those losing croplands,the compensation is Rs 1 lakh an acre. For those losing vegetable and fruit gardens,compensation would be as per existing government rate. Revenue Divisional Commissioner Pradipta Mohapatra,who chaired the meeting in Jagatsinghpur,said each of the displaced undivided families would get 10 decimals homestead land on which Posco would build a three-bedroom house. Members of the families aged above 18 would be treated as a separate family and given 10 decimals of homestead land each. Posco would give Rs 1.66 lakh to them to build own houses. The families would get Rs 2,300 a month for a year as maintenance allowance if they cant find work and a one-time relocation allowance of Rs 5,000. Besides,a member from each family would get a regular job in Posco. But Abhay Sahoo,of the Posco Pratirodh Sangram Samiti,said the CM cheated the people by not keeping his promise of visiting affected villages. We reject the package. If company or government officials come to our village to implement the package,we would not allow them.
