House panel flays steel policy

“The Committee feel that NSP is not a well structured policy. NSP does not propose any concrete mechanism to address important issues such as problems faced in grant or renewal of mining leases and inordinate delay in obtaining environmental clearances etc which hamper the growth and development of steel industry,” the Parliamentary Committee on Public Undertakings said in its report.

It argued that all corporate plans and expansion plans of steel PSUs such as SAIL and RINL, which are being implemented in pursuance of the goals of NSP will be adversely affected if the difficulties are not addressed in the right earnest.

“The Committee are disappointed to find that NSP is too inadequate in addressing the burning issues.” As regards the delays in obtaining clearances, the Committee said though NSP proposes a single window clearance for large projects to be followed by statutory clearances by the ministries concerned, it does not clearly spell out a time frame within which clearances should be granted. Observing that mineral-rich states would recommend renewal of existing leases only against credible mining investment plans against a specified period, the Parliamentary panel said NSP has failed to spell out clear-cut modalities in this connection.

Meanwhile, the country’s crude steel production has grown at more than 10% annually from 34.71 MT in 2002-03 to 53.90 MT in the last fiscal while the production of finished steel stood at 55.27 MT during 2007-08 as against 40.71 MT in 2003-04. Sponge iron grew at a CAGR of 22% to reach a level of 18.35 MT in 2006-07 compared to 7.68 MT in 2002-03.

In tune with the NSP, state-run steel...