___________

Pioneer reports on this. Following are some excerpts:

Club City, a leading food court chain known for its unique food fusion concept, opened its 19th outlet at Swagat Palace at Bhouma Nagar on Sunday.

… he food chain successfully mixes Indian delicacies with that of American European, Chinese and Mexican food flavours. Initially, her outlet could manage to bring four food concept brands out of the total 15 — Dosa Plaza, Sanghai Post, Chillzzzz and Club Thai. Dosa Plaza is India’s largest menu of Dosa making and would cater to nearly 27 varieties of Dosas, while Shanghai Post would deal with delicate Chinese items. Chillzzz and Club Thai would offer varieties of Mocktails and shakes along with delicacies of Thailand .

Deepikaglobal has another report which talks about Club city’s further plans.

… about seven more outlets would be opened in Orissa to cater to the customers growing demand of ‘fun dining’ experience. The new outlets would be opened in Jharsuguda, Cuttack, Puri and Bhubaneswar, he added. … The CEO also added that the traditional Oriya cuisine would soon be included in the menu.

• Burla and Berhampur medical schools seats increased to 150 each (0)
• Fee structure for engineering, MCA, MBA, BDS and Medical announced (2)
• Seat increase in plus 2 science and commerce in many government colleges (0)
• The story of Udaipur library and the man behind it: help needed (0)
• From the AICTE pages: List of approved Pharmacy institutions in Orissa – 2007-08 (July 12 2007) (0)
• From the AICTE pages: List of approved MCA institutions in Orissa – 2007-08 (July 12 2007) (0)
• From the AICTE pages: List of approved MBA institutions in Orissa – 2007-08 (July 12 2007) (0)
• About: Orissa engineering colleges in the AICTE list and their number of seats (July 12 2007) (0)
• Orissa engineering colleges in the AICTE list and their number of seats (July 12 2007) (2)
• More pictures and plan diagrams of proposed Vedanta University (0)
• Management educational opportunities in Rourkela to increase in quality and quantity (0)
• Chandipur PXE gets a national research award (0)
• IIPM School of managemnt, Rourkela: promoted by ICICI and L & T (0)
• Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan ad with statistics (by the central government) (0)
• Lalit Patnaik’s message on Agamee odisha meeting about KBK University (0)
• Orissa JEE counselling time table (1)
• Two articles and a slide show on Vedanta University in the Chronicles of Higher Education (1)
• Existing Central Universities in India: speculations on where the next ones will be and should be (0)
• Education in the 11th plan: higher education working group recommends medical schools in each central university in the north eastern region (0)
• KIIT plans an autism center at KIMS (1)
• Opportunities in retail management and logistics (0)
• Planning Commission: Report of the Oversight Committee to Monitor Implementation of Reservation in Higher Educational Institutions. (0)
• Naveen requests setting up of a jems and jewellery training institute in Ganjam (2)
• Special school for child laborers (0)
• Cultural dimension of education (1)
• Sarva Siksha Abhiyan: EGS (Education Guarantee Scheme) and its follow-up (0)
• Distance Education programs offered by Berhampur University (0)
• SCB got back the 43 seats it had recently lost (0)
• Two central universities per state (0)
• Seven new IIMs, higher salary for professors etc. (0)
• More details on the new and exisiting central universities (0)
• Two more engineering colleges are being established in Bhubaneswar (0)
• Standing up for the backward areas of Orissa and India (0)
• Groups interested in setting up of private universities in Orissa; land provided by Orissa to various universities (0)
• Center plans to ease MCI conditions for opening medical colleges in NRHM states (0)
• Seat reduction at SCB Medical college; CM writes to center (0)
• Orissa AIEEE site updated for 2007 (10)
• Agami Odisha plans a convention on the KBK Central University issue on July 8th (0)
• Sai International establishing a school near Infocity (1)
• Orissa JEE counseling brochure is available now (17)
• Pragativadi: Prof. Gopal Nayak recommended as IIIT Bhubaneswar director (0)
• Ravenshaw University Vice Chancellor’s presentation in Detroit, MI, USA (0)
• BPUT advertises for M.Tech and M.Pharm (6)
• Jobs at Vedanta for B.Sc graduates (1)
• New Indian Express reports on AIIMS branch in Bhubaneswar (1)
• Analyzing the 2004 Orissa JEE student preferences (14)
• Orissa Engineering Colleges in Dataquest Ranking (1)
• Samaja ad: Sponsored courses at Utkal University (0)
• NISER advtertises for teaching positions (3)
• Tathya.in: PM promises IIT for Orissa (Is this for real? ) (2)
• Pioneer and Statesman: Bhubaneswar in the shortlist for one of the 4 new NIDs in the 11th plan (2)

Earlier it was reported that 20 stations (its started with 16 then became 17, tehn 19 and now 20) in India will be made world class. The 20 stations as reported here are: Agra, Ahmedabad, Amritsar, Anand Vihar (Delhi), Bangalore, Bhopal, Bhubaneswar, Bijwasan (Delhi), Chandigarh, Chennai, Mumbai CST, Howrah, Jaipur, Lucknow, Mathura, Patna, Pune, Secunderabad, Thiruvananthapuram and Varanasi.

In case of Bhubaneswar, due to lack of land adjacent to the existing Bhubaneswar station, there was speculation and bits of news regarding a new world class station being built in Barang. The following news report from Sambada confirms it.

Pioneer reports on this grant to Puri under JNNRUM. (Additional site 1, site 2, site 3) Following are some excerpts from that report.

… sanctions were accorded to 10 new development projects in Puri under the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission entailing an estimated expenditure of Rs 186 crore. … The project includes construction of a new lodging house for tourists at a cost of Rs 20 crore, a renovation project for old mutts costing Rs 100 crore, construction of a new multistoreyed parking place for vehicles worth Rs10 crore, a new conference hall specially for holy discourses valuing Rs10 crore, a cultural heritage site for the Jagannath Temple pegged at Rs10 crore, renovation and maintenance of old ponds in Puri for Rs 20 crore, establishment of a new heritage museum inside SriMandir at a cost of Rs 5 crore, construction of a heritage garden inside Sri Jagannath Ballava Math at a cost of Rs10 crore, construction of concrete road around the Meghanad Prachir (compound wall) with steel barricades costing Rs 50 lakh and construction of drains and other sanitary works valuing Rs 50 lakh in Puri town.

Telegraph reports the information on this given by the Science and Technology minister in the assembly. Following are some excerpts:

… Science and technology minister Sanjeev Sahoo today told the Assembly that the proposed Biotech-Pharma-IT park would be developed in an area of approximately 260 acre in two phases on a public-private partnership mode.

In the first phase, a park would be constructed over 63acre of land in Andharua Mouza on the outskirts of Bhubaneswar. The Biotech park at Andharua will have a BT corridor, an IT corridor and a commercial infrastructure. A biotech incubator would be set up there over 10 acre, he added.

Sahoo said the companies, which have expressed their interest for participating in the global bid process, are Akruti Nirman Ltd, Ambience Developers and Infrastructure Pvt Ltd, Bharat Biotech International Ltd, Bhubaneswar Entertainment World Developers Pvt Ltd, Eldeco Infrastructure and Properties Ltd, Ramkay Infrastructure Ltd, TCG Urban Infrastructure Holding Ltd and Unitech Ltd.

The private partner would play the role of the lead developer and would be responsible of the plan, design, construct, finance, market and operate the proposed park.

Once a private partner is selected, a Special Purpose Vehicle(SPV) company in the form of a Joint Venture between the private partner and the State government will be created for the development and maintenance of the Park, Sahoo said.

For the biotech park at Andharua, IDCO has been given Rs 2 crore for construction of wall, land development, digging of borewells and setting up transformers.

The state-of-the-art Biotech Pharma-IT park will have modular R&D labs, a biotech incubator, and administration support infrastructure. The Park will stimulate and manage the knowledge flow and create linkages between universities, R&D institutions, companies and markets.

(Thanks to Deba Nayak for the pointer to this report.)

Telegraph reports that AMRI hospital plans to set up a state of the art hospital in Bhubaneswar. Following are excerpts of that report.

AMRI Hospitals today unveiled its ambitious expansion plan to set up four state-of-the-art hospitals in four state capitals — Bhubaneswar, Ranchi, Raipur and Patna.

Each of the four hospitals will be set up with an initial investment of over Rs 110 crore, with room for future expansion. …

AMRI Hospitals, a joint venture between Emami and Shrachi group of industries, is venturing out of Calcutta for the first time.

… Aditya Agarwal, director, told The Telegraph that the first of the four hospitals will come up at Bhubaneswar.

The hospital will come up at Khandagiri Square, a prime location in Bhubaneswar and will have 300 beds initially.

“It will come up on 5 acres. Initially, it will be a five storey affair, but we have plans and enough room for further expansion,” Agarwal said and added that the hospital at Bhubaneswar is expected to start operation by 2009.

It will have, apart from facilities available at any multi-speciality hospital of international standard, super-speciality thrust on cardiology, orthopaedics and neurology, Agarwal claimed.

“Our hospital in Bhubaneswar will have emergency and outdoor facilities. We will deploy most sophisticated equipment and staff, including doctors, there. It will also have state-of-the-art ICCU, ITU and NITU and life-support systems,” the director informed.

Apart from giving people access to ‘healthcare facilities of international standard’, the hospital will also generate a lot of job opportunities, he claimed.

“The hospital in Bhubaneswar will initially have some 1,000 employees, including medical, para-medical and non-medical staff. The first preference will obviously be to recruit local people. …

Among other facilities, the hospital will have a parking bay, cafeterias and playground to mention only a few standard facilities available in any major hospital, he said.

“We have earmarked an estimated Rs 120 crore on this hospital. However, more investment will be made according to the requirement for future expansion.”

“The foundation laying ceremony at Bhubaneswar will be held on July 14. Chief minister Naveen Patnaik, finance minister Prafulla Chandra Ghadai, industry minister Biswabhusan Harichandan, minister of works and housing A.U. Singh Deo and health minister Duryodhan Majhi will be present on the occasion,” Agarwal informed. …

Agarwal added that AMRI Hospitals, a joint venture between Emami and Sharachi groups, has plans to establish at least one medical college in one of the four state capitals.

“Talks in that direction are on. We also plan to have some specialised medical and nursing training facilities. A decision on this matter will be taken soon,” he declared.

(Thanks to Jibanendra babu and Orissa Today google group for pointer to this report.)

Earlier news mentioned about IBM expanding to or eying various tier 2 cities including Bhubaneswar. Economic Times now reports that the center in Bhubaneswar will be a development center. Following are excerpts from that report.

IT major IBM will soon open its third development centre in Orissa’s capital city. …

Sources said TCS, Infosys and Satyam already had their centres here while Wipro, Mindtree and Hexaware were expected to decide on their plan soon. Genpact had already committed to invest at Infocity-1, the state government’s IT cluster. …

The IBM team, on its part, assured the state government that they would provide technical know-how for Orissa’s ongoing e-governance programme.

Brain has also assured Patnaik that IBM would help the government to develop the proposed Indian Institute of Information Technology (IIIT) in Bhubaneswar.

IBM already has two centres, one in Chennai and another in Coimbatore, the sources added.

Telegraph reports on this. Following are some excerpts.

artisans working on blocks of sandstone along the west banks of the sacred Bindusagar Tank. …

The area around the tank is being converted into a medicinal plant garden, with all the elements of Ekamra Kshetra in mind — a mythological garden. …

The garden, that would cost Rs 72 lakhs, would also have an amla tree (symbolising Parvati) and a bel symbolising Ganesha. The three would have their own pedestals with substructures on which medicinal herbs would be planted. …

The park would have two large pools in between the trees that would contain naturally-purified water seeping in through the earth from Bindusagar. …

… there would be a small platform for music to add to the holy ambience.

Artisans from Raghurajpur and Lalitgiri have been engaged to complete the work that is expected to be over by the next month.

We have used nothing except sandstone and laterite, …

… the boundary and retaining wall would bear exquisite carvings depicting the lord and his stay at the Ekamra Kshetra. …

Cities like Bhubaneswar are very important in terms of heritage, tourism and religion. Its our department’s responsibility to check that the temple city gets its historical and architectural glory back.

Statesman reports on an IBM Center in Bhubaneswar. Following is an excerpt.

IBM is likely to establish a development centre in Bhubaneswar. A release issued by the CMO here said that indications to this effect were given by Mr Stephen W Braim, the vice-president, IBM Asia Pacific, today. Mr Braim met chief minister Mr Naveen Patnaik and discussed IT development and human resource development to meet the growing demand of such professionals. IBM has two development centres in the country and the one proposed to come up in Bhubaneswar will be its third centre, said the release.

The Orissa government’s call for expression of interest on this is here. (Thanks to Manoj Padhi for the pointer.)

New Indian Express reports on the water supply situation in Bhubaneswar. Following are some excerpts.

For a population of 8 lakh, the Capital city has just 52,000 connections each catering to a family of five to six persons. …

Not only does coverage need keep pace with expansion, there is an increasing necessity to modernise the entire system. Realising the need, both Public Health Engineering Department (PHED) and Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC) are busy chalking out a plan.

The proposal is to be placed for consideration under Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (NURM).

Currently, Bhubaneswar meets its demand mostly from Kuakhai river, while the infrastructure for water treatment and distribution have come up in different phases. Mahanadi too contributes substantially for the city’s requirements.

As of now, the existing supply system fully covers 17 wards (out of 47) with pipe-water supply while another 26 wards are partially covered. The rest are without any cover.

A study carried out on the system reveals that supply is intermittent, while pipelines have shrunk. The total length of pipelines – main and distribution – are about 900 km in length.

However, since most of these were laid in 1950s and 1960s, they throw up problems. While density of population has increased, the same has rendered existing supply lines inadequate.

This also explains why water distribution has not been uniform – quantity as well as pressure wise. Moreover, main transmission lines are now old and lead contamination with sewerage lines which has become a cause of concern.

Similarly, intake infrastructure, water treatment plants and pump houses are now old and need renovation. The city has seven water treatment plants built during the last four decades.

Statistics available with PHED says seven treatment plants were built in 1954, 1960, 1968, 1974, 1975, 1987 and 1996 which speaks volumes about the need to upgrade and replace them.

Of the seven plants, four are for Kuakhai with total capacity of 19.5 million gallons for day (MGD), while the two for Daya can treat 3 MGD water.

It is the Mundali Water Works which has the biggest capacity of MGD. It was built in 1996.

Another problem with the locations and capacities of storage reservoirs. In the city, there are 87 underground and over ground reservoirs while there are another 46 elevated service tanks.

The headache for these storage points is that they are not integrated.

The proposed modernisation plan will take into account the revenue model as user charges are not fixed as per consumption level.

This is from a document regarding the vision 2030 plan for Bhubaneswar that has been prepared by IIT Kharagpur.

• Zones for multiplex, Retail-malls and theme parks for outdoor recreation
• Film city development with ample natural resources and back up from Orissa film industry with necessary infrastructure
• Logistic Hub for the prime urban centers
• Textile parks with cottages and medium scale industries for local specialized weaving art.
• Development of another major Railway Station, to cater to the trains for Western Orissa
• Circular Trains for cheaper mass transportation within urban areas
• Upgrading the existing Airport for tourists and higher officials for government and private sectors in the capital city
• Multi level Freeways for better accessibility with all roadside modern facilities ( Private Sector participation)
• World Class Club-towns
• Flood management plan for Cuttack with innovative technology (Venice Model)
• Garland Lake System to develop and protect the water bodies in the region
• Major organized open spaces like, urban squares, ceremonial / recreational grounds, and permanent fair grounds as image developers
• Health city/ Education city/ Software parks etc (new urban districts)
• Waterfront development with landscape conservation
• Travel Circuit (Architecture/Archeology/Religious) with facilities like “Palace on Wheels” for international and national tourists
• “Utkal Sanskriti Prangan” – A representational centre of traditional art and culture, craft,cuisine, living style, fair and facilities of Orissa at Bhubaneswar.
• Development of Traditional Art Village (Paper/Cloth/Silver/Pottery) in the line of “Arts Acre” in the peri-urban areas of Bhubaneswar
• Adventure tourism for Reserve forest/ Nature Study camp areas for rare natural species zone
• Development of Nature Corridors –to provide a feel of flora and fauna in the urban setup
• Area development of Lingaraj temple and Bindu Sagar with new allied activities

Tathya.in reports that OTV will now have competition to its cable business. Following are excerpts of that report.

Wire and Wireless India Limited (WWIL and Ushodaya Enterprises Private Limited (UEPL), which controls popular ETV joined hands to float Variety Entertainment Private Limited (VEPL) …

VEPL, which has set up the state of the art control rooms in Bhubaneswar and Rourkela promises to provide better cable services in the cities of Orissa.

Announcing the launching of the services Deepak Chandnani, CEO WWIL, said that it will provide 87 channels of national and regional interest to the viewers in Orissa.

He said the services will be expanded in near future to provide digital services including triple play – voice, video and data under the aegis of “GalaxZee” by digitalization of signals.

Chandnani said GalaxZee will provide crystal clear picture, digital audio and video quality.

More number of channels will be added with multilingual facility, said he.

Provision for e-education, e-commerce gamming and video on demand facilities will be given in near future, said Chandnani.

Arvinda Mohan, Executive Director, WWIL said that the cable network service in Orissa depends on the court’s verdict.

Business standard reports that SBI has started one more regional business unit in Bhubaneswar. Following are some excerpts.

As a part of the decentralisation process and to provide prompt and qualitative service to the customer, the State Bank of India (SBI) has set up one more regional business office in Orissa. With this the total regional business office of the bank has reached five in the state.

The new regional office will function under the Bhubaneswar zonal office of the bank. …

The new regional office will cover 6 branches in the Khurda district and eight branches of Nayagarh district along with 16 branches of the Bhubaneswar city.

Though to start with the bank will have 30 branches and 24 ATMs under its jurisdiction , two more branches are likely to be opened in that area taking the total to 32. While 16 branches are located in urban areas, 5 branches are located in semi-urban areas. Besides, 9 branches are located in rural areas.

Significantly, 23 branches out of these 30 branches have Core Banking Solutions (CBS) facility.

The new region has a deposit of Rs.748.55 crore and advance of Rs.569.39 crore as on May 2007. The decision to set up the fifth regional office is significant as SBI is the lead bank in both Khurda and Nayagarh districts.

Besides, the bank has initiated measures to implement financial inclusion in Nayagarh district. SBI has a presence at every nook and corner of the state and its branches are financial bigbazars, selling all the products under one roof.

The bank has 502 branches at present and 60 percent of the branches are located in rural areas. Subject to Reserve Banks permission, the bank intended to open 40 more branches this fiscal. SBI has taken several measures to improve customer care through business process re-engineering.

Besides, it is involved in various social activities of the state. …

SBI is the lead bank in 19 districts of the state.

Various news reports mention that CARE hospital plans to open a 100 bed hospital in Bhubaneswar in July.

New Indian Express reports the starting of the BPO company Medwrite in Bhubaneswar. Following is an excerpt from that report.

MedWrite India, a Hyderabad based healthcare business process outsourcing (BPO) firm, launched its city operations on Wednesday.

The state-of-the-art centre will engage 200 trained professionals. Addressing mediapersons, chief executive officer Srinivas Rao said plans are afoot to raise the head-count to 500 professionals by the fall of 2008.

It handles medical billing and transcription services to a vast number of hospitals, clinics and physicians across the United States.

The firm would shortly be launching a free training programme for undergraduates and graduates to cater to the growing needs of skilled manpower in the industry. MedWrite is chosen as the international partner of MedQuist, a leading medical transcription company in the US …

Pragativadi reports that a mega water park is being built 6kms from Phulnakhara, in between Bhubaneswar and Cuttack. Following are some excerpts from that report.

The proposed water park will have several provisions such as several rides, interactive play area, fun slides, float slide, speed coaster, wave pool, splash water, swimming pool, kids pool, live music, concerts, DJ and rain dance. This apart, it will have an exclusive park for the people to roam about, different types of costumes, video games, indoor games, food & beverages, parking facility, advertisement & publicity, film shooting, special events, baby sitting facility, bus facility at select places and ATM facility. … The company has future project for establishing an Amusement Park with roller coaster rides etc. The park would provide highest level of service, quality, safety as far as construction, maintenance and operation are concerned. It would also boost the tourism industry of Orissa. One of the novel features of the park is the wave pool which is a replica of an ocean. The simulating waves created in the pool provide an exotic fun. One can either use a raft or choose to simply sweep off his feet at the shore. The pools are designed and manufactured to allow for gently swaying waves or powerful larger waves for fast paced body or boogie board surfing. It simulates a beach-like feeling inside the park.

New Indian express reports that multiplay service will be introduced in Cuttack-bhubaneswar metro unit. Multiplay basically involves having a framework which will provide multiple services under a single network. The list of services include voice, data and internet protocol television (IPTV) services under one package. Once connected, the subscriber can avail various services like cable TV, phone, high speed internet and even watch videos on demand through a set top box acquired on hire or outright purchase basis. Following are excerpts from the New Indian Express report.

The public sector telecom company has firmed up plans to introduce its next generation service “Multiplay” in the Twin City as soon as it is able to cement association with content providers.

While the infrastructure is being spruced up to required levels, the company has sought expression of interest (EOI) from private content providers for the tie-up. …

According to Deputy General Manager (IT), BSNL Orissa, PK Chand, Multiplay would offer voice, data and internet protocol television (IPTV) services under one package. Once connected, the subscriber can avail various services like cable TV, phone, high speed internet and even watch videos on demand through a set top box acquired on hire or outright purchase basis.

And as the system takes roots, other features like gaming, TV-based education, audio, T-commerce, video telephony and personal video digital recording can be included in the wide array of interactive applications.

BSNL has commercially launched the Multiplay services for its broadband customers in Pune in March this year in collaboration with the Maharashtra Knowledge Corporation Limited and Divinet as content provider.

Besides data, internet and voice services, IPTV and video on demand have been launched in the initial phase.

More than 100 free to air and pay channels are provided under the IPTV platform while the video on demand enables one watch movies of his choice at his own convenient time.

This is one of the pioneering technologies which underlies the potential of bhubaneswar as a desitination. Even cities like Bangalore and hyderabad dont provide this facility at this point…

• Some good news on national institutes front
• Letter to SAC-PM on science magnet schools
• XIMB’s forway into satellite based management programs
• Orissa among the bottom in terms of its universities’ performance in civil service exams
• Update on IIIT Bhubaneswar
• Samaja on vocational courses
• Some excerpts from the PM’s address with comments and questions from me
• PM’s address at the 150th anniversary of University of Mumbai: 30 new Central universities to be established
• 2004 data on Orissa JEE and Orissa engineering colleges: can’t understand it completely
• Sambada has opened a school of mass communication and culture through its charitable trust
• RMRC Bhubaneswar will have facility for diagnosis of viral infections
• Sambada: BJD MP Braja Tripathy writes to PM on KBK Central University
• Which University to recommend for central university status?
• Orissa JEE has released additional rankings
• Rejoinder to Mr. Jairam Ramesh’s comments in Bhubaneswar on the IIT Orissa issue
• Which option is better IISER, NIT or IIST and why?
• IIT JEE 2007 Counseling brochure
• Plus two science colleges in Bhubaneswar-Cuttack area
• New Indian Express: Our government will fight for central varsity – Naveen
• Dharitri Editorial: Kendrara ghaitapania (Spousal abuse by center)
• Statesman: Naveen’s missive on varsity in KBK region
• New Indian Express: Orissa feels rejected once again
• Pioneer: Naveen shoots off letter to PM over central varisty in KBK
• Ganjam district has the maximum number of out-of-school students in Orissa
• Higher education vision document in the offing
• Orissatv.com: Center’s decision to shift proposed tribal university to Madhya Pradesh objected – CM says it is another example of center’s negligence
• Statesman: CM demands varisty in KBK region
• Sambada: After IIT Central University in KBK is also out of hand
• Fax campaign against repeated injustice by MHRD
• Dharitri: Hopes dashed on KBK Central University
• Pioneer: Arjun hijacks plans for KBK varisty
• Ex and founding VC of BPUT Prof. Damodar Acharya will be IIT Kharagpur director from July 2007
• Indira Gandhi National Tribal University in Madhya Pradesh – Orissa had proposed a similar university in KBK
• Orissa JEE result is out: some links

Economic Times reports  road development related to POSCO’s proposed operations. Following are excerpts from that report.

… the government has decided to develop 600 km of highways, to be called Posco roads, to provide connectivity for the 12 million-tonne capacity steel plant in Orissa. The Rs 4,000-crore highway would be constructed on built-operate-transfer (BOT) model and would be completed by 2010. 

The projects are part of phase-III of the National Highways Development Programme (NHDP). The Posco package consists of seven road stretches, including Panikholi-Keonjhar-Rimoli on national highway (NH)-215 and Chandikhole-Duburi on NH-200. The Cuttack-Paradip state road, jointly funded by the Orissa government, Paradip Port Trust and the roads ministry, will also help serve the transport of goods to and from Posco’s steel plant.

“NH-215 and NH-200 will be specifically geared to carry iron-ore traffic,” the official said. “The roads will serve Orissa’s industrial requirements for upcoming projects in the state, but Posco will be the biggest beneficiary,” he added.  …

Apart from road connectivity being provided by the Centre and the state government, a special purpose vehicle (SPV) to link Haridaspur and Paradip by railways has been formed by Rail Vikas Nigam (RVNL) in which Posco has 10% equity,” a Posco spokesperson said.  …

Posco-India will also build a captive port at Jatadhari, 10 km from Paradip and a captive power plant with a capacity of 1300 mw.  …

The company will also lay pipelines for industrial water utilisation from Jobra barrage.

Financial Express reports the establishment of a new multi-specialty hospital in Bhubaneswar. Following are excerpts of that report.

The Orissa-based Ayush Hospital & Trauma Care Pvt Ltd (AHTC) is setting up a multi-speciality hospital in Bhubaneswar with an investment of Rs 13.5 crore.

“The hospital is ready and it will be thrown open for patients from the first week of July 2007”, the founder director of the hospital, Dr Ashok Acharya, told FE. …

Besides the cardiac facilities, the hospital will have to its credit an MRI unit and a critical care ambulance that can bring critical patients from any corner of the state.

The Hindu has a nice short travelogue on driving on the GQ from Kolkata to Bhubaneswar in 5 hours.

(Thanks to Jibanendra babu for noticing the article and mentioning it in the Orissa Today group.)

There are plans to connect the Pravat cinema area to Samrat Cinema area in Cuttack by a flyover. For people who are new in Cuttack ‘Pravat Cinema’ is close to two big landmarks. Rajatarangini Cinema Hall and Buxi Bazaar. Buxi Bazaar is the central point in Cuttack. Following are excerpts from a Pioneer report.

Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik on Wednesday held a review meeting on the progress of the upcoming over-bridge that would connect Pravat Cinema to Samrat Cinema. The projected cost of the bridge is estimated at Rs 144 crore.Later speaking to reporters, Cuttack MLA and Minister Sameer Dey said Finance department would release Rs 1.50 crore to the RITES organisation to prepare the detailed project report of the project.

It has not yet been decided whether the bridge that starts from Pravat cinema will touch the Malgodam area or not. The DPR of the project will be completed within five months.

As a byline I might add that there is a huge drain which runs from Pravat cinema till Samrat cinema. It would be a good idea to have a flyover over that. This will eliminate the need for land acquisition and improve sanitation in CMC.