Even in a polity inured to contradictions, the case of Orissa and POSCO is difficult to explain. In late June, the South Korean steel giant signed an agreement with the BJD-led state government, committing to invest in a $ 12 billion steel plant complex. This made Orissa the unlikely beneficiary of India’s single-biggest instance of FDI. On offer is a rare blockbuster deal that could, potentially, be a big push for a historic economic laggard to enter the fast lane. Directly and indirectly, the project would employ 50,000 people. Orissa, home to prodigious iron ore deposits but limited infrastructure, has won POSCO against international competition, beating off challenge from Brazil. If anything, the Naveen Patnaik government deserves a nod of appreciation for presenting its state as POSCO’s land of opportunity.Conventional logic is, however, not political logic. While the government in Bhubaneswar has been enthusiastically backed by the Centre, the local Congress is opposing the project. J.B. Patnaik, former Congress chief minister, has threatened a mass agitation, with helpful support from the Left. He has also written an article in a newspaper owned by his son-in-law demanding the MoU with POSCO be scrapped. To add to this saga of paradoxes, Juel Oram, state BJP unit president and former Union minister, has released a POSCO chargesheet — 12 angry questions about the deal. The local Congress’s case — which the local BJP seems to half buy into, despite being a member of the ruling alliance — is that the terms are loaded in favour of the Korean corporation, which is apparently only coming to grab Orissa’s precious iron ore. The Congress’s national leadership — as well as that of the BJP, when it can spare the time from its serial existential crises — needs to check these silly tendencies before they actually do damage. Orissa cannot suffer because one Patnaik can’t stand the other getting some credit.
