Breakthrough on preliminaries; more details being negotiated.
Steel major ArcelorMittal has agreed to pay Rs 5,000 per decimal of land to each land loser for its proposed steel plant in Jharkhand’s Bokaro district. This translates into Rs 5 lakh an acre. It will be for the first lot of land proposed to be taken over; the discussions are not over yet.
A meeting was held between ArcelorMittal officials, including general manager P S Prasad, and hundreds of villagers on the premises of a school at Armo in the affected area.
“We have reached some kind of understanding with the land losers and the ballpark compensation is Rs 5 lakh an acre. But these are preliminary discussions,” said an ArcelorMittal spokesperson.
The company also agreed to provide a monthly pension of Rs 5,000 to each affected nuclear family for three years from the date of acquiring land. The group would also provide jobs to each family which would lose land for installing the plant.
The company is also to train educated youths of the concerned area to undertake skilled jobs. Those who do not want a job in the company would get compensation for a period of 30 years.
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The company says it will also provide basic infrastructure, including schools, roads, drinking water health care and power to the area.
The discussions pertain to the first tranche of 2,500 acres that the company would acquire in and around the Bemrotand and Ormo panchayats, in the first phase.
Bokaro district’s deputy commissioner, Satendra Singh, said the state administration would act as a facilitator in setting up the steel plant. The administration would provide the company land records and ensure a safe working environment.