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Following is an excerpt from a report in Business Standard on this.

Arcelor-Mittal’s proposed Rs 40,000 crore, 12 million tonne per annum greenfield steel project in Orissa has made headway with the start of the land survey at the proposed site in Patna tehsil in the Keonjher district.

While the company has launched the survey in 16 villages in the area, it has completed the process in four villages. The company has also submitted a land acquisition plan to the state government.

Meanwhile, though the company has finalised a rehabilitation and resettlement (R&R) plan for the project-affected people, it is waiting for the land clearance from the state authorities to submit it to the government.

“We have our R & R proposal ready. Once the state government gives clearance of land, we will submit the proposal”, said Malay Mukherjee, member, group management board, Arcelor-Mittal.

Talking to mediapersons after a meeting on the progress of the project chaired by Chief Secretary Ajit Kumar Tripathy, Mukherjee said about 70% of the detailed project report (DPR) work for the Keonjhar plant is complete. The report is expected to be finalised by June 2008, he added.

M N Dastur & Company is preparing the DPR. The scope of the DPR, among other things, includes captive mining facilities, captive power supply, water supply and other infrastructure facilities like effluent disposal, environment and township for the company�s employees. …

While the company has got a coal block along with five other companies in Rampia and dipside Rampia, it is exploring the possibility of forging partnership with a mining company to source iron ore till it is allotted captive mines. It has recently applied for a joint partnership with the state- owned Orissa Mining Corporation (OMC) in this regard. …

While the total reserves in Rampia and dipside Rampia is estimated at about 600 million tonne, Arcelor-Mittal is expected to get about 85 million tonne.

Mukherjee said a 10-member team of Arcelor-Mittal is now finalising the technical specifications of the steel plant.

Following is an excerpt from a report in Hindu. (Thanks to Deba Nayak for the pointer.)

… the poor people of the mineral-rich tribal population dominated district of Keonjhar are gearing up to welcome the Mittals and the tribe.

In a dramatic development, Kendujhar Nagarik Manch, the five-year-old district citizens’ forum, in its meeting on Friday resolved to host a symposium at the district headquarter on the need for industrialisation on December 2 to deliberate its benefits for the people of the district. “About 300 people including politicians, opinion makers, academicians, social activists and media persons would be attending it,” forum secretary Mr.Himansu Kuanr told The Hindu.

Industrialisation “We would welcome industrialisation with value addition,” he stated and added that the steel giants like the Mittal would be using the latest technology that would ensure minimum pollution. Sloppy land would be acquired for setting up of the plants and the packages being offered would also benefit the land losers, he said.

Some political parties are misguiding the people by spreading mis-information on the projects and thereby arresting development of the region through industrialisation, the forum’s spokesperson felt.

Mr.Kuanr further pointed out that in the past four years, minerals worth about Rs.36, 000 crore have been exported from the district without rendering any direct benefit to the people of the district. “As Haryana farmers have been amply benefited by industrialisation in and around Delhi, the farmers of the district would be similarly be benefited from industrialisation,” he reasoned.

Following is an excerpt from a report in Business Standard.

Mittal Steel India, which is in the process of readying its rehabilitation and resettlement (R&R) package for its 12 million tonne Orissa project, will consider issue of shares and land-for-land as part of its compensation to land-losers.

Sanak Mishra, chief executive officer, Mittal Steel India said, “The Orissa government’s R&R policy includes issue of shares as a means of compensation and if the people want it, we will do it. But that will happen at the implementation stage and we have to see the legal standpoint and the mechanism.”

Mittal Steel hopes to finalise the draft R&R package and make presentations to the Orissa government by month end. “If the Orissa government wants to incorporate something, we will look into it.”

The state government’s policy mentions convertible preference share as a compensation option. It says that at the option of the displaced family and subject to the provisions of relevant laws in force, the project authority could issue convertible preference shares or secured bonds up to a maximum of 50 per cent out of one-time cash assistance.

“There were also other physical issues being considered like alternative land for the displaced people. We will, however, have to assess how much land is required,” said Mishra.

… After finalising the scheme in consultation with the state government, Mittal Steel plans to embark on a communication programme with the land-losers.

The project site is a mix of government and private land. The 12 million steel plant at
Keonjhar would require around 8,000 acres, which includes 1,000 acres for the captive power plant and 1,000 acres for the township.

Mittal Steel is also in dialogue with the Orissa for iron ore mines. Various options are being explored, including arrangement with the Orissa Mining Corporation (OMC), a state-owned mining corporation.

“Talks are at an exploratory stage and it was too premature to talk about it. An arrangement with OMC could enable Mittal Steel to go through captive iron ore mine allocation process, which was one of the stumbling blocks for the company’s Jharkhand project,” Mishra added. Mittal Steel requires around 600 million tonnes of iron ore over a 30-year period for its steel plant.

Following is an excerpt from a report in Times of India about this.

… “We have received a proposal from Arcelor-Mittal, requesting for an arrangement with OMC,” confirmed a senior officer. “The government is exploring the possibilities and details remain to be worked out. It could mean a long term agreement or a joint venture between the two parties,” the officer told TOI. The government, sources said, has set up a four-member committee headed by chief secretary to examine the proposal’s feasibility and chalk out the draft terms and conditions.

Sources said Arcelor-Mittal is yet to submit any application for prospecting lease or mining lease for any iron ore deposits, but evidently does not want to take chances. Hence, it has proposed a tie-up with the state-owned body to serve as a back-up. “The company would no doubt go for captive mines. The pact with OMC would ensure an alternative raw material arrangement for the company’s project,” sources pointed out. Orissa has so far inked pacts for 46 steel facilities, sparking doubts over iron ore scarcity in future.

Arcelor-Mittal, which has signed an MoU with the state government to set up a 12 MTPA steel plant at an investment of Rs 40,000 crore, is the first major player to make this kind of a proposal. Some small steel units had earlier sought to enter into raw material supply agreements with OMC, apparently to ensure a steady flow of iron ore and offset price fluctuations. Some steel plants, which have reached production stage, are buying ore from the market at higher prices, sources disclosed.

Following are excerpts from a report on this in sify.com.

Stemcor India, which is setting up a Rs 1,500 crore iron ore pelletisation project in Orissa, achieved financial closure, securing Rs 960 crore debt with SBI Capital Markets as the lead arranger.

Stemcor India, a subsidiary of Stemcor, the London-headquartered $5 billion steel trading major headed by Ralph Oppenheimer, will fund the remaining Rs 540 crore through equity in setting up a 4 million tonne pellet plant in Kalinganagar.

This will be connected by a 220-km slurry pipeline to Barbil, in Keonjhar district, the heart of private iron ore mining in Orissa, where a beneficiation unit would be located.

Senior Stemcor India officials said that with the financial closure, the first tonne of pellets would be out in 2009.

Several steel companies, already in Kalinganagar or implementing projects, have submitted letters of intent to source raw materials from Stemcor.

The demand is such that the order book for at least 75 per cent of the projected capacity has already been secured.

The company plans to set aside 25 per cent of output to be placed in the spot market to benefit from rising prices of pellets.

Officials said that while the prices of pellets would be on a negotiated basis with customers, lump ore price charged by NMDC Ltd, the state-run mining major, would serve as a benchmark price for the domestic market.

Kalinganagar is the destination for many steel companies like Tata Steel, Visa Steel, Bhushan Steel, Jindal Stainless, Murugappa group and Maharashtra Seamless.

Many of these companies, which do not have mining linkages, are obvious customers of Stemcor pellets.

… In the domestic market, smaller non-integrated steel plants, which typically have blast furnaces but no iron ore plant or sinter plants and do not have resources to invest in pelletisation, would source raw materials from Stemcor.

Also, metallurgically, a combination of lumps and pellets fed into blast furnaces can increase steel production substantially. The Orissa beneficiation and pelletisation project is Stemcor’s second plant after a 6 million tonne plant in Tasmania.

In 2000, Stemcor had entered into a joint venture with Essar for a pelletisation plant in Vishakapatanam but later sold a 51 per cent stake to Essar.

Following are excerpts from a report in New Indian Express.

The State Government has prepared a Rs 850-crore draft project proposal under the National Food Security Mission (NFSM) for placing before the Centre for funding. The objective of the mission is to increase production and productivity of rice and pulses in 21 of 30 districts of the State in a sustainable manner.

The other objectives are to enhance farm level economy, restore confidence among farmers and create employment opportunities.

While 15 districts will be covered under NFSM for rice, 10 districts have been chosen for increased production of pulses. While Balangir, Kalahandi, Keonjhar and Nayagarh will be covered under the mission both in rice and pulses, the districts covered under NFSM in pulses include Bargarh, Cuttack, Ganjam, Khurda, Puri and Rayagada.

The project, to be implemented during the 11th Plan period , is expected to cover 20 lakh hectares for rice cultivation and 13.57 lakh hectares for pulses. The State has planned to increase yield of rice from 1,690 kg per hectare in 2007-08 to 2,095 kg per hectare by 2011-12 in the mission districts.

The estimated production of rice in the mission districts will increase from 33 lakh tonnes to 42 lakh tonnes. It has projected to enhance the productivity of pulses from 478 kg per hectare in 2007-08 to 594 kg per hectare in 2011-12. The low yield of rice in the State is due to several factors.

While more cultivable areas are under rainfed conditions, the kharif and rabi crops are totally dependent on monsoon rains. Lack of farm mechanisation, improved technology, training of farmers, soil management, pest management and non-availability of quality seeds are the other factors for low productivity.

The Centre will provide full financial assistance and the fund will be utilised for introduction of hybrid seeds, scientific management of problematic soil, pest management, farm mechanisation, training of farmers, Agriculture Director Arabinda Padhee said. The Government has projected to spend Rs 650 crore for rice production and Rs 200 crore for improved farming of pulses.

Following up on the ad that appeared in Samaja, there have been several reports with more details. Following are excerpts from a New Indian Express report.

The airline will operate eight-seater aircraft from the Capital City to places like Barbil, Keonjhar, Jharsuguda, Jeypore, Sambalpur and Rayagada.

Ticket fare to Barbil would cost around Rs 5000 and to Jeypore Rs 7000. For corporate flyers and individuals buying to and fro tickets, a 40 percent discount can be availed of as an introductory offer.

General Manager (operations) Sumit Mukherjee said, those buying one-way ticket would also be given a 30 percent concession. Talking to mediapersons here, he said, the airline had already positioned one Islander BN2T turboprop aircraft capable of short takeoff and landing on these routes.

The travelling time would vary from 50 minutes to 1 hour and 15 minutes. Services would run on all days expect Sundays. A Bell 206 BIII helicopter with four seats would be introduced for charter service, he said. Sky Airways is a division of New Delhi-based GSI Pvt. Ltd and is headquartered in Kolkata.

… “We will introduce two aircraft to these places with a seating capacity for 19 passengers before the end of the current year.”

Another news item mentioned that they plan to fly from such towns to Kolkata in the future.

Following is a bit of information on Sky Airways:

• A report in Telegraph mentions the following:

… Sky Airways (backed by the M.L. Agarwal group, with business interests in Orissa�s mining and steel sectors) …

Following is an excerpt from a Reuters report.

Officials in Orissa said on Thursday they had earmarked 7,000 acres of government and private land for a steel project proposed by Arcelor Mittal.

Last December, Arcelor Mittal, the world’s biggest steel maker, signed a multi-billion deal with the state government to build the 12 million tonne plant, and is also planning a similar sized steel unit in Jharkhand.

“We have cleared 7,000 acres of land for the steel project and captive power plant so that they can start work (aquiring land),” Orissa’s Industry Secretary Ashok Dalwai told Reuters.

He said most of the land was owned by the state but Arcelor Mittal would have to purchase some from farmers, a potentially controversial process the Orissa government would facilitate.

Hundreds of families are living on the state-owned land and would have to be moved.

The company still has to tie up a mining lease.

… The Arcelor Mittal project also includes a 750 MW power plant. The company had asked for 1,000 acres (400 hectares) on which to build homes for workers, in addition to 7,000 acres for the steel plant itself.

Supporters say the project would provide jobs for 5,500 people directly and another 15,000 indirectly.

In July, Arcelor Mittal Chief Executive Lakshmi Mittal had said that a detailed project report would be ready by mid-2008 and the first phase of the plant would be commissioned within four years of the report’s completion.

State officials said on Thursday the project would only get formal clearance once that report had been submitted.

See http://tathya.in/story.asp?sno=1185.

In the following wikimapia map the location is either to the right or left of the spot labeled as "Patna."

The following ad in Samaja gives highlights of two recently launched schemes in agriculture:

• National Food Security Mission (NFSM)
  • The 15 districts in Orissa covered under the NFSM-Rice scheme (as given in page 40 of the above document) are Angul, Balangir, Boudha, Deogarh, Dhenkanal, Jajpur, Jharsuguda, Kalahandi, Keonjhar, Malkangiri, Nawapara, Nawarangpur, Nayagarh, Phulbani, and Sundargarh.
  • The 10 districts in Orissa covered under the NFSM-Pulse scheme (as given in page 43 of the above document) are Balangir, Baragarh, Cuttack, Ganjam, Kalahandi, Keonjhar, Khurda, Nayagarh, Puri, Rayagada.
• Rashtriya Krishi Vikash Yojana (RKVY)

The Pioneer reported that

Tata Steel has converted a wasteland into an attractive park and dedicated it to the citizens of Joda valley in Keonjhar district on the occasion of its centenary year.

A couple of years back this barren wasteland by the side of the main road in Joda was just a parking place for trucks or grazing field for the animals.

Kalinga Times has a more elaborate article on this.

Follow are excerpts from a Statesman report.

The high powered committee headed by chief secretary Mr Ajit Tripathy today cleared 16 investment proposals, entailing an investment of approximately Rs 30,000 crore.

The projects mainly in the power, steel, aluminium and cement sectors were amongst the 40 project proposals placed before the committee. There were three steel and three power projects amongst the 16 which got the nod today.

Significantly while the Ashapura mines chemicals project proposal for a aluminium refinery was approved, the aluminium project of IMFA Group headed by Dr Bansidhar Panda was held up.

… two task forces had been constituted to further evaluate the proposals in the cement and power sectors. The Industry secretary will head the task force for cement sector projects while the development commissioner will be in charge of the task force for power projects, …

The power projects cleared by the committee today included the Bhusan Energy project which intends to establish a 2,000 MW thermal power plant at Angul with an investment of Rs 8,483 crore. The Visa Power Limited’s 1,000 mw Thermal Power plant at Brhamnabasta in Cuttack district at a cost of Rs 3,698 crore was also cleared while the third power project was of Monnet Energy at Sundergarh. It will be a 1,000 mw plant.

The Rs 4,232 crore aluminium project of Ashpura Mines Chemicals to come up in Koraput district was cleared. It aims at setting up a 5 lakh ton refinery and a 1.5 lakh ton smelter plant besides having a 300 MW captive power plant .

The Committee approved the three new steel plant projects and the expansion of existing five steel projects in the state.

Bonei Industry company’s project to set up a plant at Sundergarh at a cost of Rs 302 crore, M/s Rungta Sons Ltd’s proposal to set up a steel plant at Barmunda at a cost of Rs 930 crore and Free Grade company Ltd’s steel plant at Dhenkanal at a cost of Rs 603 crore were also cleared.

Expansion proposals of SMC Power Generation and MSP Mettalics at Jharsuguda, Braja Ispat, Rourkela and the Keonjhar Orient Ispat were given the go ahead by the committee.

ACC Cement’s proposal for investment of Rs 400 crore for its capacity development was approved while Goa Carbons Ltd’s proposal for a CPC coke plant with an investment of Rs 225 crore was also cleared.

Times of India mentioned that 

Orissa government has asked the Arcelor-Mittal group to reassess the land requirement for its proposed greenfield steel project in Keonjhar district.

A similar report was also published in Business Standard saying that

Worried over the resistance of the people to land acquisition and allegations of land grabbing by industrial houses in the name of setting up industries, the Orissa government intends to make realistic assessment of the land requirement of various industries interested in setting up manufacturing facilities in the state. In the process, the government has decided to take a re-look at Arcelor-Mittal’s land requirement for its proposed 12 million-tonne-per-annum steel plant in Keonjhar district’s Patna Tehsil. This follows a presentation by the company to the state industry department officials on the project.

The company has sought 8,000 acres for the project, which includes land for construction of a 750MW captive power plant and a civil township. However, all indications are that only a ‘reasonable’ piece of land will be given to the company.

Hindustan Times and others report on this. Following are some excerpts from the Hindustan Times report.

Steel baron Lakshmi Mittal’s global giant Arcelor Mittal is planning to advance the construction at its 10 million tonnes (MT) Orissa plant and hopes to begin initial construction by mid-2008, as against the earlier date of 2009. …

The first phase of Arcelor Mittal’s plant in Orissa, with a capacity of six million tonnes, is likely to be commissioned by 2011.

The company has appointed Dastur & Co to carry out a detailed project report and environment management plan for the two sites, which are currently underway. Chief Executive Officer of Mittal Steel India Ltd, Sanak Mishra, said that major construction work in the site will be taken up in 2009 and the company has finalised the product mix of the proposed plant for both long and flat products.

Economic times reports that Mittal is more postive of the progress in Orissa for it’s steel plant.

Excerpts”

BHUBANESWAR: Arcelor-Mittal group CEO L N Mittal expressed his preference for the company’s proposed mega steel plant in Orissa over the one planned in Jharkhand, even as the Orissa government committed itself to provide requisite land and raw material for the greenfield project.If things go as planned, Mittal even indicated to CM Naveen Patnaik and senior government functionaries that the world’s largest steel company is keen to start leg work in January 2008.

“We are very happy with the pace of progress in Orissa. We would certainly prefer Orissa to Jharkhand considering the progress,” Mittal said, emerging from a 150-minute meeting with the CM and his team.

“We are all working hard towards starting the project as fast as possible,” he told reporters, without mentioning any deadline. The steel moghul said he was “very happy” with the way things have moved ever since the company signed an MoU with the state government in December 2006 for a 12 million tonne per annum steel plant in Keonjhar district.

“The Dastur co is preparing the detailed project report and it should be ready by mid-2008,” he said.

On the mines linkage, Mittal, who was accompanied by his son Aditya and Mittal-India CEO Sanak Mishra, said after the “very detailed discussions” with the CM, he was “very confident” about getting required access to mines. He added that he was “very optimistic” about effectively tackling rehabilitation and resettlement issues.

According to official sources, the steel monarch requested the state government to acquire at least a part of the 8,000-acre land earmarked for the project, especially the encroachment-free government land, so that the company could begin some “work on the ground early next year”. Mittal, the sources said, sought to know about the mining linkage and the government assured him full support without committing any specific mines.

Odisha.com reports that South Eastern Railway will start passenger carrying train between Keonjhar and Tata from August 15th. Some of the stations between Keonjhar and Tata are Keonjhargarh(98)- Goaldih(109)- Porjanpur(116)- Nayagarh(130)- Jaroli(146)- Bansapani (155)-Murg Mahadev Rd(164)-Deojhar(167)-Padapahar (183)- Dangoaposi(188) – Maluka(198)- Kendposi(208)- Talaburu(217)-Jhinkpani(226)-Singhpokharia(235) –Chaibasa (242)-Pandrasali(250)-Rajkharswan(262) (between Chakradharpur and Tata) … Tata (304). Currently a Janshatabdi runs from Howrha to Tata to Barbil via Padapahar. So the proposed new train will newly connect people with access to stations in between Keonjhar and Padapahar to Tata and the rest of the world.