Torpa knows time is running out

The residents of Torpa are understandably desperate to get the proposed ArcelorMittal steel plant to their district, given the complete lack of development in the area.

"Brickfields operate in the area for some time, and then shut down because the demand for even building material is very low and the people there move away," says restaurant owner Jagat Ghosh on the highway running through Torpa.

"If it does not happen this time, the project will go away to Singhbhum and Jamshedpur areas," he predicts.

"Because of the cancellation of the hydel dam project, people who were investing in a small way have backed out. I spent money on my building foundation and the first floor slab but then did not add the walls and make rooms because there is no demand for accommodation," Ghosh says.

As a result, there are many buildings in Torpa that only have the concrete ground level slab and the first floor, but have been left unfinished "" all projects abandoned midway when the Koel Karo project was abandoned too.

Like the rest of the community, small businessmen like Ghosh are praying that Torpa does not miss out on the chance thrown up by the Mittal offer.

Just 60 km south of state capital Ranchi, Torpa block is now in Khunti district, formed in September 2007.

Torpa block covers 506 sq km (that works out to 111,763 acres), has no industry except for three micro-enterprises making bricks and shellac, and no irrigation facilities.

As a result, it is a single crop district dependent entirely on the monsoon rains and the total revenue demand for cultivated area of 86,224 acres is ""believe it a not "" a mere Rs 98,000 per year!

Nonetheless, it has a sprawling administrative complex comprising a dozen-odd, completely vacant buildings, a basic block hospital, some schools and a struggling line of shops sprung along the highway passing through to the steel towns of Jamshedpur and Rourkela.

The poverty and lack of development in the district is borne out by other data as well "" out of the 14,515 registered families in the block, 9,200 are below the poverty line.

In terms of ethnic mix, 56,000 tribals represent the largest group in the block, which has a total population of 77,190 persons, according to the last census.

The poverty is because of mono-cropping, and as a senior block administrative official said, "There are no canals, just a few shallow wells which are tapped using pumps to irrigate 50-70 acres in the fallow seasons."

"The block office created job opportunities for 10,775 underprivileged families under the central and state government's anti-poverty schemes in December 2007, and the number has been going up 70-80 families every month as we are trying to draw families into government schemes," said the official.

"We are here only to run these schemes because the revenue demand does not justify the block office," he admitted, adding, "this will change totally if investments come in like the hydel unit or the steel plant".

Luckily, the Naxalite groups are not very active in the area and the only reason manufacturing units have not done well in the block, and Khunti district, is the overall underdevelopment that dominates Jharkhand.