WHY BUDDHA SAID SORRY

videocon Steel, Baraboni
A Rs 15,000-crore steel project is coming up at Baraboni near Asansol. The MoU for the project was inked in October. The 3-mtpa steel plant and 1,200 MW captive power plant is coming up on 4,000 acres. The company has already negotiated prices for 2,000 acres with farmers and is waiting for the Government’s clearance to start acquiring land. It’s giving the farmers an option between shares in the company or cash for their land.

Jai Balaji Steel, Raghunathpur
The Chief Minister recently laid the foundation for this project. The integrated 5-mtpa steel plant, 3-mtpa cement plant and 1,215 MW power plant has an investment of Rs 16,000 crore. The project is expected to provide direct and indirect employment to a large number of people. The project would be spread across 4,000 acres, of which the company would be building a 500-acre township.

Indian Oil Corporation expansion, Haldia
IOC will be spending Rs 3,000 crore to expand its capacity at Haldia from the 6 mtpa at present to 7.5 mtpa. The petroleum major is also planning to set up a paraxylene plant in the area that will feed the Mitsubishi Chemical plant in the area. IOC requires an additional 210 acres for expansion, which it expects to get from the shipping ministry.

Tata Motors small car factory, Singur
The West Bengal Government has handed over about 1,000 acres for the Tata Motors car project where work is on. The Tatas propose to invest over Rs 1,000 crore. Besides, over 60 vendors are to set up their units with an approximate investment of about Rs 500 crore. Despite the land acquisition row, Chairman of the Tata Group Ratan Tata remains bullish on the state, saying the company will roll out its cars on schedule by mid-2008.

CESC power plant, Haldia
The RPG Group-owned CESC is planning to build a thermal power plant at Haldia that is going to produce 2600 MW of power. The investment for the project would be Rs 10,000 crore. The project is scheduled to be operational within three years from March 2008. Land requirement for this project is around 2,000 acres.

Kolkata West Project
The project is being promoted by the Salim Group, an Indonesia-based company which is developing a mega township in Howrah, spanning 2,500 acres at a cost of Rs 2,500 crore. The US$ 20 billion Salim group is developing the township along with the Kolkata Metropolitan development Authority (KMDA). The Salim Group, in fact, had also expressed interest in developing the chemical hub that was to come up at Nandigram before the row over land acquisition forced the site to shift to Nayachar.

Tata Motors Telcon factory, kharagpur
The project that is nearing completion near Kharagpur is a subsidiary of Tata Motors and is built over 340 acres at an investment of Rs 600 crore. The factory will manufacture heavy earth moving machinery and is expected to be completed within a year and to provide employment to 500 people.

COMPANY TALK
Biswadip Gupta, chairman, CII, eastern region and joint managing director and CEO, JSW Bengal
“If the Nandigram-Singur syndrome continues, the perception problem about West Bengal may arise again. The state has to move cautiously so that no negative signal is sent out to investors. Perception is not something one can measure but it can be highly damaging. Hopefully, things will quell down.”

Venugopal Dhoot, chairman, Videocon Group
“Recent events surrounding Nandigram and Singur and the row over entry of organised retail in the state has not impacted the image of West Bengal so much as an investment friendly destination for outside investors. Nandigram is only a small part of the state that had a problem. It is more of propaganda and the violence is not as severe as has been portrayed. I do not know about the political scenario but the industrial scenario in the state is definitely looking up.”

Aniruddha Lahiri, India head, Chatterjee Group’s TCG
“The news about Nandigram has had a negative connotation for the state. The perception of the state as an investment destination had changed in the past five years, and that might have taken a slight beating. Though Nandigram might have a short-term effect, I do not think that there is any need to fear about the flight of capital.”

Sanjiv Goenka, vice-president, RPG Enterprises
“Land acquisition for my project in the state is taking place very smoothly. I do not think that Nandigram is a risk factor at all.”

Sanjay Budhia, managing director, Patton International Ltd
“It is business as usual in West Bengal. What happened in Nandigram should not be taken as the general economic scenario in the state. The fundamentals of the state are strong and that is what is helping the state attract investments. There have been so many foreign delegations in the last few days, which is an indicator of the renewed interest in the state.”

S Radhakrishnan, president, Bengal Chamber of Commerce & Industry
“If Nandigram were to affect the industrialisation in the state then business in other places like Gujarat and Mumbai (after the riots and the bomb blast respectively) should have been affected the most. What happened in Nandigram is unfortunate but I do not accept the theory that it is a risk factor.”
-Aveek Datta