Bhubaneswar, Aug 19 (Inditop.com) South Korean steel major Posco Wednesday dismissed reports that its proposed steel plant in Orissa is being relocated to another site.
“It is a baseless report. We don’t have any plan to relocate to a different site. We are fully committed to the project and (will) build the project with full co-operation of local people in the proposed site,” said Saroj Kumar Mohapatra, senior general manager of Posco India, a subsidiary of the South Korean steel major.
Earlier, media reports had quoted Minister of Mines B.K. Handique saying that Posco India was facing problems of land acquisition and planning to relocate to a different site from the proposed location in the coastal district of Jagatsinghpur.
But the state government was quick to deny the reports and Orissa Mines Secretary Ashok Dalwai and state Mines Minister Raghunath Mohanty issued statements to allay the fears.
Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik also said the project was not being shifted.
“Posco will not move to any other location as the reports suggest. It will be set up in the proposed site,” Patnaik told reporters in New Delhi.
Posco, one of the world’s biggest steel makers, signed a deal with the state government in June 2005 to set up the plant near the port town of Paradeep in the coastal district of Jagatsinghpur, some 100 km from here by 2016.
There has been no significant progress on the project, the largest foreign direct investment in India, since then due to local opposition.
Over 20,000 people from around 15 villages, including Dhinkia, Gada Kujanga and Nuagaon, are protesting the project, saying it will displace them and ruin their betel leaf farming.
Posco, however, says the proposed plant would affect only 500 families but it would create thousands of jobs.
