)
Revival of the Sindri unit of loss-making Fertilizer Corporation Of India Ltd is facing fresh hurdles as Steel Authority of India Ltd is unlikely to make any investments until the land at the plant side is freed from encroachments and encumbrances, sources said.
"We have told the Fertiliser Ministry and the FCIL to get the land cleared from encroachments and encumbrances before allotting it to SAIL. Until it is done, it is unlikely that SAIL will be making any investment for reviving the Sindri unit of FCIL," official sources said.
The revival of the Sindri (Jharkhand) unit was earlier stuck as Fertilizer Corporation Of India Ltd (FCIL) was under the purview of Board of Industrial and Financial Restructuring (BIFR) due to its negative net worth.
However, in June, the FCI had come out of BIFR's purview after the union government submitted papers related to the Cabinet decision of waiving off about Rs 10,000 crore loan and interests of the loss-making company.
To resuscitate the Sindri unit, Steel Authority of India Ltd (SAIL) had earlier proposed to set up a new 1.15 million tonnes per annum (MTPA) capacity fertiliser plant, a new steel mill of 5.6 MTPA capacity and a 1,000 MW power plant at a total investment of Rs 35,000 crore.
According to the plan, the new gas-based urea plant would be set up after dismantling and disposing of the existing unit.
The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) had cleared SAIL's proposal in August, 2011 and a new company, SAIL Sindri Projects Ltd, was created in November, 2011 for the venture by the state-run steelmaker.
However, getting the land cleared at the Sindri plant is a herculean task as a large part out of the total 6,652.6 acres is either encroached, leased/transferred, illegally occupied or falls on the river bed, official sources said.
While the factory and staff quarters are spread over 1,200 acres each, there are illegal occupants in about 3,000 staff quarters out of 6,542 quarters in the plant premises.
Moreover, nearly 450 acres have permanently been given to BIT Sindri and over 200 acres have been leased to the ACC cement factory, while over 450 acres have been leased to the state government.
Additionally, nearly 470 acres are part of Gowai dam, over 550 acres of land are on the Damodar river bed and nearly 700 acres land has been leased to central PSUs. There are 26 villages on the factory land as well and displacing them is a big task, official sources added.
On the other hand, SAIL needs about 2,500 acres for the steel plant, about 1,000 acres for the fertiliser plant and 500 acres for the power plant.
In its annual report for 2012-13, the steelmaker said that "Department of Fertilisers (DoF)/FCIL have initiated the process for obtaining approval of revised Draft Rehabilitation Scheme from the CCEA, for making its net worth positive, enabling FCIL to be discharged from BIFR."
