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The Odisha government has declared the much-awaited additional rehabilitation and resettlement package for the affected families of the Tata Steel project at Gopalpur in Ganjam district.
"We discussed the implementation of the package at a meeting held on Wednesday," said district collector, PC Chaudhary. Tata Steel would spend around Rs 300-crore for implementation of the additional package, said a company officer. As per the new compensation package, preference will be given for job to one member of each of the core displaced families in the Gopalpur project or any associated company of Tata Steel outside Gopalpur. The age limit for the job-seekers would be relaxed up to 40 years.
The company would pay Rs 7 lakh per core family and Rs 5 lakh per extended family, if they don't opt for jobs in the company. Similarly, the land losers would get an additional Rs 5 lakh per acres of land.
After the revision of the list of extended families among the project affected, each newly added family would get building assistance of Rs 3 lakh. In addition, each core and extended project affected family would get Rs 5,000 per month as maintenance allowance for next two years.
These apart, a corpus fund of Rs 30-crore would be set up at the district collector level to assist the affected families earn livelihood under various suitable schemes.
As many as 656 core families and 989 extended families of at least five villages near Gopalpur were displaced in 1996, when the steel giant acquired 2,970 acres of land to set up a 10 million tonne shore-based steel plant. While the families of Sindhigaon, Badapaur, Patrapur, Kalipalli and Paikapada were displaced for the purpose, families of other eight villages lost their agricultural land.
Tata Steel later shelved the steel plant project and decided to set up an Industrial Park and multi-product SEZ there. As an anchor tenant of the industrial hub, the company is now setting up 55,000 tonne per annum capacity ferrochrome plant in the complex at an investment of around Rs 400-crore. The plant will start operation by July 2015, sources said. At the time of acquisition of land in mid-90s, Tata Steel had paid Rs 1 lakh per acre to the land losers and promised job to at least one member of each displaced family. The land losers were agitating lately demanding additional assistance as per the market rate. "We will discuss among the affected people about the new package and will take further course of action," said Jagannath Reddy, president of the association formed to protect the interest of the project affected families.
