specially constituted green bench of the Supreme Court headed by chief justice KG Balakrishnan on Friday lifted all legal hurdles for two controversial projects
NEW DELHI: A specially constituted green bench of the Supreme Court headed by chief justice KG Balakrishnan on Friday lifted all legal hurdles for two controversial projects in the country’s mineral bowl of Orissa.
After giving its nod to South Korea-based steel giant Posco to start its $12 bn plant over nearly 3,000 acres of forest land, the court signed another ruling giving the green signal to British company Vedanta Resources' controversial bauxite mining project in the state worth around $1bn. Vedanta's project requires nearly 1,632 acres of forest land.
Land disputes, protests by environmental groups and delays in getting mining licenses had stalled ventures by the global metal companies.
With the SC nod to Posco for its mega steel plant and to Vedanta’s Indian subsidiary Sterlite, the forest diversion proposals for the plant sites have also been cleared.
The SC bench has, however, asked the state government to implement compensatory afforestation plan under the supervision of a SC-appointed committee.
Welcoming the decision, Posco India senior general manager Vikash Sharan said, “We reiterate our commitment to the project and are determined to move ahead in terms of land preparation and construction activities at full speed.”
Posco had on June 22, 2005, entered into an MoU with the Orissa government for a steel plant there. It is eyeing Orissa’s Kandhadar mines, which are estimated to have a reserve of about 150 mn tonnes of iron ore.
Meanwhile, though the special forest bench comprising CJI KG Balakrishnan, Justices Arijit Pasayat and SH Kapadia allowed Sterlite to go ahead with bauxite mining, it has been asked to pay for development of the Niyamgiri mountainous region. Turn to p7
The Supreme Court said Sterlite Industries will have to pay 10% of its profits or Rs100mn (whichever is more) for development of the region, , home to a large tribal population. Anil Agarwal-promoted Sterlite Industries has signed an agreement with the Orissa government to mine bauxite from the ecologically fragile Niyamgiri hills for its proposed aluminium project in Orissa.
Faced with stiff resistance against setting up the Sterlite plant, the court had barred Vedanta in November last year from conducting open cast mining of bauxite in the Niyamgiri hills.
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