Daily Pioneer; Moushumi Basu; Wednesday, October 27, 2010
Jindal Steel plant got 168 hectares
At a time when the Odisha forest department is under fire for its ‘controversial’ role in granting clearance to Vedanta and Posco, yet another skeleton has tumbled out of its cupboard.
The scandal relates to utter violation of environment clearance norms by Jindal Steel and Power Ltd (JSPL) in setting up an integrated `10,000 crore steel plant with 6 million tonnes per annum capacity and a captive power plant of 1,000 MW on 168.232 hectares forest land at Badkerjang, in Angul district of the State.
The major irregularity which allegedly took place in connivance with senior bureaucrats has been exposed through a RTI application filed by noted environmentalist Biswajit Mohanty.
The total requirement of land was projected to be 2160.385 hectares of which 168.232 hectares happens to be forest land. The company obtained Environment Clearance on February 22, 2007 from the Ministry of Environment and Forest.
However, as per environment clearance norms, the company could start construction only after getting forest clearance. This was as per condition no A (xvi) of the EC which states, “No construction activity at the project site shall be initiated till the approval of forest land is obtained under the Forest Conservation Act,1980…….”
The forest diversion proposal was forwarded to the Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) on August 4, 2008. However, the company in violation of the provisions of Forest Conservation Act 1980, undertook construction work even during the pendency of the application.
This was detected by the then DFO, Angul Forest Division. In his show-cause notice dated October 6, 2009, pointing to the brazen violation of the Act, he stated that work had started on non-forest land prior to clearance. The user agency (company) was directed to stop all work. However, heedless of any such orders from the DFO, the company as on date continues with the construction work. No steps have been taken to arrest the officers of the company either, for flouting the orders as well.
The DFO then sent a copy of this stop work order notice to the office of the then PCCF, Odisha as also to the District Collector Angul on October 6, 2009.
He also wrote to the Member Secretary of the State Pollution Control Board on October 13, 2009, requesting him to take action for such flagrant violation of the norms of Environmental Clearance. However, the Pollution Control Board not only ignored the letter of the DFO for punitive action against the company, but did not even inform the Environment Ministry of the lapses, which could have otherwise resulted in cancellation of the Environment Clearance.
The RTI notes the connivance of senior officers in the forest department with the company officials considering that they did not pursue the matter for nine months of receiving the DFO’s show-cause notice issued to JSPL.
Such suppression of facts related to violations of EC, enabled the company to obtain Stage I forest clearance on March 30, 2010. The facts clearly indicate that the forest clearance was “illegally” obtained as vital information and developments subsequent to the filing of the diversion application were suppressed.
So much so, even the Secretary of the Steel and Mines Department of the State was aware that civil construction was in full swing before March 2010 i.e., before they obtained forest clearance. But the department also chose to remain tightlipped and concealed the fact from the regulatory agencies which is also indicative of their involvement.
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