Steel king Mittal brings 40,000 cr gift

NEW DELHI: Steel king LN Mittal, who was on a thanksgiving mission to India after the $32.5 million Mittal-Arcelor deal, announced a Rs40,000 crore  (Rs400 billion) greenfield project in Orissa on Friday.

Mittal met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Finance Minister P Chidambaram, and Ratan Tata in New Delhi.

His 12 million tonne steel plant is a win-win deal for Orissa and Mittal. It will help the former to bargain better with South Korean steel giant POSCO and the latter to bargain with Jharkhand.

POSCO has been pressing Orissa for a mining lease licence. But the state has been insisting that the licence will be granted only if the steelmaker uses at least 25 per cent of its planned investments.

Mittal was non-committal on whether his discussions with CM Naveen Patnaik bring down the curtains on his company’s plans in neighbouring Jharkhand. He said mining and land issues are unclear in Jharkhand. “We will like to weigh our options,” he said. “We will go with the project that makes faster progress.”

Mittal also denied any plan to acquire Indian steelmakers at present. “First let the Indian companies grow,” he said.