With the world’s biggest steel producer Arcelor Mittal expressing serious resentment over the delay in land acquisition in Jharkhand and Orissa, the steel ministry has swung into action and has decided to convene a meeting of the chief secretaries of these mineral-rich states to resolve the issues involving a mega investment of more than Rs 80,000 crore for the company’s two proposed large steel plants.

“The company continues to work on its two greenfield projects in Jharkhand and Orissa. However, in the event that land acquisition continues to prove difficult, we will start to search for alternative sites in India for our greenfield projects,” Arcelor Mittal chief Lakshmi Niwas Mittal had said recently, an assertion which has galvanised the government to swing into action. “We had met steel secretary P K Rastogi this week and he assured us that his ministry would soon convene a meeting of the chief secretaries of Jharkhand and Orissa to resolve the issues related to our projects including the critical one of land acquisition,” Arcelor Mittal India Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Vijay Bhatnagar told The Indian Express.

Rastogi said in course of the meeting, Bhatnagar categorically denied media reports that the company was pulling out of the country. “But they told me that they were facing problems in land acquisition in Jharkhand more than Orissa. We will sincerely try for an amicable resolution of the company’s problems pertaining to its investment.”

Though the company has not been able to acquire land in either of these two states, the situation is more serious in Jharkhand than in Orissa. Attributing the delay in land acquisition to “social activism”, Bhatnagar reasoned that if faced with further delays, “the company does reserve the right to think in terms of re-locating the project from Torpa-Tamdara (Jharkhand) to an alternative site within the state.” He said that the state government has allocated about 1,200 acres of government land and as required by the state, 80 per cent of the cost of the allocated land has been deposited with the government.

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