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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | Orissa uses public purpose alibi to acquire land for Posco by Nitin Sethi

Orissa uses public purpose alibi to acquire land for Posco by Nitin Sethi

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published Published on May 30, 2011   modified Modified on May 30, 2011
A state government announces it is going to acquire land for 'public purpose'. The public purpose is to hand over the land to a specific private company. It decides to do so through one of its corporations claiming there is urgency – which helps override any legal objections from the landowners.

Everyone in the region and the state government knows who the land is intended for – Posco -- but the agency, Orissa Industrial Infrastructure Development Corporation (IDCO), claims it is acquiring land for 'industries' at large and not for Posco specifically. But documents IDCO provided to the Orissa High Court in the case prove otherwise and the records of the state government are clear – it is for Posco's integrated steel plant at Jagatsinghpura.

This is how the loopholes in the existing Land Acquisition Act get exploited. The Posco case is now in the HC and the petitioners have pleaded that IDCO cannot acquire land for a private company under the Land Acquisition Act.

The Act provides that the government can acquire land for a private company only if it is meant for dwelling of the company's workers.

IDCO – an Orissa government corporation – has claimed it is doing so only for 'industries'. In its response to the courts, it has claimed it's not specifically for Posco. The records show otherwise. The government notification for acquiring land says it's being done by IDCO using public money for Posco. The local land record officer too, while attempting to make land acquisition settlements in the affected villages, claims the land is being acquired for an integrated steel plant for Posco.

By claiming public purpose and using the urgency clause of the Act, the state government has dispensed with the rights of the affected people to even file objections to the acquisition.

The loopholes in laws allow IDCO to acquire land for 'promotion of industries' claiming it to be 'public purpose' though it cannot do so for a specific company. In its affidavit before the court, IDCO has used this in its defence, suggesting that the land was being bought for 'industries' in general and not Posco in specific.

Yet, in the same affidavit, IDCO goes on to claim that even the integrated steel plant from Posco would provide 'public purpose'. It has claimed Posco would provide 'lakhs and lakhs' of jobs in the coming years and constitute 10% of the state's income apart from providing 'huge revenue' to the Centre and the state.

The Times of India, 30 May, 2011, http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Orissa-uses-public-purpose-alibi-to-acquire-land-for-Posco/articleshow/8641914.cms


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