Jindal starts giving money to willing land sellers

Midnapur July 18 (UNI): Land and land revenue department of West Midnapur district administration today started disbursing cheques to willing peasants against their lands for the proposed Jindal Steel plant project known as (Salboni JSW Bengal Steel Project) from today.

District Magistrate Bhabani Prasad Barat, who was personnaly present in the first day's distribution of cheques, said that 15 peasants, who had given some 12 acres of land, were given cheque at the rate of Rs. 3 Lakh per acre land and Rs. 2.75 lakh per acre for non-agricultural land.

Vice president of Salboni JSW Project Rajesh Gupta had announced before the district magistrate and reporters the unique economic and social package for the peasents, who will be offering 450 acres of their personnal land for the project.

The package has three conditions.

The first part says that 50 per cent of the fixed land value will be provided through cheques and the other 50 per cent would be invested in life insurence projects to make the compensation socially meaningful. If, however, any peasant declines to accept this he will be paid the entire amount through cheques.

The second condition assures one member of each land offering family to get a suitable employment in the company after necessary technical training.

The third part is that each such family would get shares of the company equivalant to their land price. The shares would be deposited in a trust controlled by the District Magistrate and the owners of the shares would be eligible to sell these shares after the first phase of the steel projects is over.

The Jindals also announced that a Jindal Foundation headed by Ms.

Sangeeta Jindal has meanwhile taken innitiative in improving the standard of living of the local people through providing infrustructural facilities like- education, health and social service in the area.

The District Magistrate said that a central team of scientist from the environment department will hold a public hearing in Salboni BDO office on August 17 and make an Envioronmental Impact Assessment of the project.

UNI