The rehabilitation & resettlement (R&R) committee of the Odisha legislative assembly has raised concerns over offer of jobs to displaced persons in Tata Steel's upcoming six million tonne greenfield project at Kalinga Nagar.
The committee, disturbed by contradicting figures made available by the company and the Jajpur district authorities, is planning to take up field verification to ascertain the actual employment position.
"In their notesheet, Tata Steel said, they have offered jobs to 10 local persons. But, according to figures available with the Jajpur collector, 200-250 persons are engaged in the construction work of the steel plant. We have to check the actual employment position at the field level. We are going to visit Kalinga Nagar in 15 days to check the implementation of the state R&R policy by the company", said Sananda Marandi, chairman of the committee.
Tata Steel sources, however, said, the Kalinga Nagar project has generated 39,496 jobs including 550 as regular employees of the company. While 21,036 are working as unskilled & semi-skilled labourers, 7,402 are skilled workers and 10,518 are engaged in supervisory/managerial cadres. As many as 26,100 jobs have been generated for people within the state, company sources added.
The R&R committee of the state assembly is mandated to appraise the performance of companies in areas like skill development, periphery development and employment.
