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State defends Vedanta refinery

Special Correspondent

Brushes aside Opposition criticism that the firm violated forest laws

BHUBANESWAR: The government on Tuesday strongly defended Vedanta Alumina Limited’s Alumina refinery at Lanjigarh in Kalahandi district in the Assembly saying that the industry had not violated any forest laws.

Countering the Opposition attack that the Naveen Patnaik Government was showing all favours to the company despite the industry posing a threat to the local environment, Steel and Mines Minister Padmanabha Behera said the company had not acquired any forestland till date.

Mr. Behera was replying to an adjournment motion that was moved by the Opposition Chief Whip and Congress leader Satyabhushan Sahu.

Countering the Opposition criticism, Mr. Behera pointed out that it was the Congress Government that had signed the Memorandum of Understanding with the company for the setting up of the alumina refinery.

As regards the mining of bauxite from the Niyamgiri hills situated close to the alumina refinery, the Minister said the State government’s recommendation for granting of mining lease to the government-run Orissa Mining Corporation had not been accepted by the Union Environment Ministry as the matter was pending before the Supreme Court following filing of three petitions by different voluntary organisations.

The Orissa Mining Corporation and the Vedanta Alumina had formed a joint venture to extract bauxite for the alumina refinery from Niyamgiri. While the company had 64 per cent stake in the venture, the Mining Corporation owned the remaining 26 per cent stake, Mr. Behera said.

The Minister, however, said that the Opposition should wait till the Supreme Court gave its verdict on the issue, Mr. Behera said. The State government would obey the Supreme Court order, he added.

Several legislators belonging to the ruling Biju Janata Dal-Bharatiya Janata Party alliance who hailed from Kalahandi district also strongly supported the alumina refinery project saying that the Opposition was unnecessarily trying to create hurdles in the way of the implementation of the project.

Earlier, several opposition legislators submitted that the company should not be allowed to mine Niyamgiri hills that was ecologically rich and was a source to a number of streams and rivulets.

They blamed Mr. Naveen Patnaik for laying the foundation stone just before the 2004 Assembly polls when the refinery project had no environment clearance. Although the alumina refinery had not got the mining linkage so far, it had been carrying out trial productions since a long time.

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