PTI reported that South Korean steel major POSCO may kick off work on its initial 8 million tonne per annum project near Paradip in Odisha by October if the state government transfers 2,700 acres of land to it.

A POSCO official said that "The Odisha government has acquired 2,100 acres. They have assured us to transfer 2,700 acres of land in next few months. After the transfer, we hope to start land preparation work for the project by October.”

He said that while POSCO required 4,004 acres of land for the 12 million tonne project, the Odisha government had said that it was not in a position to transfer entire land in one go so it has been decided to take the plant capacity to original 12 million tonne plan gradually.
The official said that "The development came in a recent meeting of our India CMD Mr YW Yoon with Odisha chief minister Mr Naveen Patnaik.”

The official said that a pact for initial plant would be finalized soon and the state government, POSCO India and its parent organization POSCO, would sign a tripartite agreement on the new arrangement very soon.

POSCO and the Odisha government have also reached an understanding to initially downsize the mega steel project to 8 million tonne from earlier proposed 12 million tonne.

The USD 12 billion project (INR 52,000 crore) is hanging fire for the last about seven years on account of land acquisition and regulatory hurdles.

Source - PTI

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