To cut Singur losses,Mamata to size,Bengal dials Centre for BHEL plant

A delegation of BHEL and state PSU Power Development Corporation Ltd (PDCL) recently visited the Tata Motors site at Singur to make an assessment of the area. BHEL,in collaboration with the PDCL,is planning to set up a 1600-MW power plant at Singur. BHEL representatives have also visited some other sites in eastern India for its proposed power plant.

“If a concern is given land for some specific purposes but it does not do that,it should not keep that land,” Chief Secretary Ashok Mohan Charabarti today said.

Last week,Chakrabarti met S N Dash,the secretary of the Heavy Industries Ministry of the Union government,and discussed the possibilities of getting BHEL,in case it chose Singur for the plant,to pay the compensation to the Tatas.

“A huge tract of land has been lying idle for three years and it’s a colossal loss to the state. That is why it is so desperate to use the land for some purpose,” a senior state government official said.

Trinamool Congress chief and Railways Minister Mamata Banerjee,however,dubbed the state government initiative a joke and said if the state government handed over the land to the railways,it will set up a wagon manufacturing unit there.

“But we are in favour of returning 400 acres of land to those farmers who did not accept the price for their land,” she said.