Jharkhand land package by May 2008

The Jharkhand government's rehabilitation and resettlement (R&R) policy, which has been holding up 64 memoranda of understanding (MoUs) worth Rs 2.5 lakh crore, is in its final stages and likely to be released by the beginning of next month.

The policy was aimed at improving the lifestyle of land-losers at least 10 times and would include a host of measures over and above the compensation.

Speaking on the sidelines of the annual regional meeting of the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), Sudhir Mahato, deputy chief minister, Jharkhand said, the policy would have some special features like a compensation of Rs 1,000 per acre to be paid to every land-loser per month over a period of 30 years.

The cap for the compensation is Rs 10,000, for instance if a person has more than 10 acres, the maximum that he would get per month for the land is Rs 10,000.Moreover, land-losers would also get one-tenth of landholding in the development area free for pursuing other means of livelihood.

Mahato said, the policy would good enough to take care of people's needs so that violence of the type seen in Nandigram was not repeated.

Companies operating in Jharkhand and those proposing projects in the state have been asked to provide inputs.

A company representative said, implementation of the policy would be an uphill task and the compensation over and above the main compensation could become too expensive for the companies.Jharkhand has around 35 per cent of the mineral reserves in the country and a host of major steel companies""domestic and global""have proposed plants in the state to cash in on the resources.

Jharkhand would be one of the last of the mineral rich states to come out with an R&R policy. Orissa was one of the first to announce a policy, followed by Chhattisgarh. Jharkhand accounts for around 22 million tons of, 40 per cent of the total new capacities announced by steel companies.

While the state has made some progress in raw material allocation, the R&R policy, has been holding up progress.Jharkhand's biggest greenfield project investors are Tata Steel, Mittal Steel India, and JSW Jharkhand.