Tatas eye Kharagpur land after Singur

After Singur, the West Bengal government has turned its focus on Kharagpur, the site for Telcon's project.

The twin project was announced on the same day as Tata Motors. State government sources said the Tatagroup was eager to start its proposed earth moving equipment project in Kharagpur as early was possible.

It may be noted that Telcon, the construction equipment arm of Tata Motors, has proposed to set up a state-of-the-art unit in Kharagpur spread over 250 acres

The Tata group is likely to invest Rs 250 crore for the project. "Telcon managing director is too keen to start the work in January. In fact they are in touch with the state government every week," said the sources.

The land acquisition in Khargpur would start from December as Tata wants to start the project from January. Besides, Telcon, the state government has also completed the acquisition of land for Tata Metaliks project in Khargpur.

"The land will be handed over to Tata group soon," added the sources.

Tata Metaliks requires around 350 acres adjacent to its existing factory in Kharagpur. As far as Singur was concerned, the sources said, Tata Motors had already initiated social welfare work in Singur.

"Tata Motors people already had a couple of sessions with the villagers for training programme," the sources added.

According to the sources, the surveyor team of Tata Motors would visit Singur any day. "They were supposed to go to Singur today, but the visit was cancelled due to some logistics problems."