Posco Fiasco

The Orissa government, backed by the Centre, brutally unleashes the police on its own people to keep its promise to Posco. Will the people overcome the challenge and save their life, land and livelihood from absolute ruin?
Bibhuti Pati Jagatsinghpur (Orissa)

When South Korean President Lee Myung-bak was in New Delhi to attend the Republic Day celebrations, Orissa Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik reportedly received an unexpected telephone call from the prime minister's office. Patnaik rushed to Delhi and, at a programme hosted by President Pratibha Patil at the Rashtrapati Bhavan, assured the South Korean president that all "hurdles" to the proposed Posco steel factory in Jagatsinghpur would soon be overcome. Three-and-a-half months later, a cold-blooded Patnaik was trying his best to keep his word. June was reportedly the deadline he had set before Myung-bak to ensure land for Posco's Rs 52,000 crore project, billed as the single biggest FDI in Indian history.

The state government has started showing an urgency it had rarely demonstrated since the mega hype it generated by signing the MoU with the steel giant on June 22, 2005, for building a 12-million-tonne-per-annum integrated steel mill at Kujanga in Jagatsinghpur district.