Odisha HRD

Vedanta University will work towards giving 25 percent seats to the students from Orissa who will be taken on merit basis: Anil Agarwal to IANS

April 27th, 2008

Following is an excerpt from an IANS report in thaiindian.com. (Also reported in indiaprwire.com.)

The Anil Agarwal Foundation, promoted by Agarwal, is setting up a multi-disciplinary world-class Vedanta University near the Konark-Puri marine drive with an investment of Rs.150 billion ($3.75 billion) in phases.

Vedanta Alumina, part of the Vedanta Resources (Sterlite) Group, is building an alumina refinery with an investment of $800 million in the state’s Kalahandi region.

It is also building an aluminium smelter project costing Rs.70 billion in Jharsuguda district.

“Our refinery project in Lanjigarh is one of the best projects in the world. We hope bauxite will be available for it,” Agarwal said.

He was hopeful of getting raw material and adequate water for the Lanjigarh project. “There is enough water in the Hirakud reservoir for industries and we will not touch a drop of water meant for farmers,” he said.

Regarding rehabilitation of the affected people, he said: “We will follow R&R (resettlement and rehabilitation) policy of the Orissa government for all our projects.” He described Orissa’s R&R policy as the best in the country.

Speaking of the progress of Vedanta University, Agarwal said in the first phase, the foundation stone for a medical college and a 600-bed hospital will be laid soon in the university campus.

“We will work towards giving 25 percent seats to the students from Orissa who will be taken on merit basis,” he remarked.

Following is an excerpt from a report in New Indian Express.

VEDANTA Resources,which has proposed a university at Puri, intends to establish a multi-disciplinary hospital of international standard in the first phase.

Work for the hospital will start during the first quarter of next year. The project is targeted to be complete by 2010.

"Health is a priority area so far as CSR is concerned," Chairman,Vedanta Resources Anil Agarwal said during a tete-e-tete with Editors of the newspapers here today.

Agarwal who met Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik earlier in the day reiterated his company’s demand for ensuring 150 million tonne of bauxite for its alumina plant at Lanjigarh. Seventy million tonne out of the total, Agarwal suggested, was to come from Niyamgiri area as assured at the time of MoU and the rest to be made available from Sasubahumali in Koraput.

The other contentious issue for Vedanta is water for its power and smelter plant at Jharsuguda. Given the agitation by farmers over use of water from Hirakud for industrial purpose, Agarwal suggested that his company is prepared to pump in Rs 30 crore as an interim measure to source water from downstream of the reservoir to avoid any conflict with farmer’s interests.

He informed that the smelter plant at Jharsuguda is all set for commercial production and would go in phases. In the first phase, the company will go for 0.5 million tonne of smelter.

Vedanta Resources has already signed 100 MoUs with different companies for ancilliarisation at Jharsguda.

Asked,why Puri was selected as the site for the university,Agarwal said, his consultants had suggested seven proposals in different states but he selected Puri for its water frontage.

Stating that the university project is estimated at Rs 15000 crore, he informed that the Anil Agarwal Foundation will fund Rs 5000 crore to begin with.

Earlier, talking to mediapersons Agarwal parried a question on AICC general secretary Rahul Gandhi opposing bauxite mining lease to refinery project.

He also informed that 25 percent of the students for the university will be given preference from the State of Orissa.

Following is from Samaja.

Entry Filed under: Bhubaneswar-Cuttack-Puri- Khurda area (1),Provisions for Odisha students,Vedanta University, Puri