Jharkhand to facilitate land acquisition for Tata Steel project

RANCHI: The Seraikela-Kharsawan district administration plans to hold a "camp court" soon to facilitate land acquisition for the Tata Steel's 12 MTPA greenfield project, proposed to come up at Seraikela in the district.

Speaking to the ET from Seraikela, deputy commissioner Rajesh Kumar Sharma said the district administration will organise a 'camp court' in order to streamline the land records in a few villages. "We plan to organise the camp next week which will be attended by the landowners," he said.

'Camp court' is organised by the administration to dispose off cases related to mutation "on the spot". "To begin with, we will organise the camp court for 2-3 villages. Depending on the response of the villagers, we may go to other villages later on," said Mr Sharma.

According to a state official, Tata Steel officials had raised the issue of delay in land acquisition for the greenfield project during a review meeting called by the industries director Aradhana Patnaik. They had said that in many cases they were finding it difficult to get the land records, thereby delaying the process. Taking note of the problem, Ms Patnaik assured that the state government will take steps to facilitate land acquisition.

The company, it is to be noted, requires 10,000 acre of land for the project. While it has applied to the district administrations of Seraikela-Kharsawan and neighbouring West Singhbhum (where processing plant is to come up) for land acquisition, it is open to direct purchase of land as well. However, the company was finding difficulty in direct purchase as many land records were out of place.

A Tata Steel official said he was not aware of the schedule of the 'camp court' but said it will definitely help expedite the land issue, as and when it is organised. The company has already got Ankua iron ore mines and Ganeshpur coal block for the project.

The Tata Steel has already completed its expansion capacity of its existing plant from 5 mtpa to 6.8 mtpa at Jamshedpur with an investment of Rs 5,000 crore, while it is in the process of expanding the capacity from 6.8 mtpa to 10 mtpa with an estimated investment of Rs 15,000 crore. The company has invested Rs 8,000 crore out it and it expects to achieve 10 mtpa capacity by 2011-12.