ROURKELA: The state government held discussions on the bottlenecks hindering the expansion of Rourkela Steel Plant (RSP) and Rourkela airport at a high-level meeting in Bhubaneswar on Thursday.
Sources said the departments of Revenue and Commerce and Transport jointly reviewed issues of land hurdles that have slowed down the expansion of both the RSP of SAIL and Rourkela airport.
Union Tribal Affairs Minister and Sundargarh MP Jual Oram, Revenue Minister Suresh Pujari, Commerce and Transport Minister BB Jena and senior officers of both the departments including Transport secretary Usha Padhee attended the meeting. Sundargarh collector Manoj S Mahajan, director-in-charge of RSP and senior authorities of Airports Authority of India (AAI) were also present.
Quoting reliable sources, the president of Sachetan Nagarik Manch (SNM) and former general secretary of Steel Executives’ Federation of India (SEFI) Bimal Bisi said the meeting was fruitful, and the government asserted to extend all possible support for the expansion plans. The RSP also agreed to provide necessary land.
Earlier on February 15, Oram had a marathon meeting with Chief Minister Mohan Charan Majhi over the two key infrastructure projects which are facing inordinate delay and uncertainty due to land hurdles. On the same day, the Commerce and Transport department had shot off a letter to the AAI chairman requesting to design a master plan and conduct an OLS survey based on the proposed plan for the upgradation and expansion of Rourkela airport for 4C CAT 1 IFR operation.
The proposed master plan envisages expansion of the runway to 2,700 metre in length and 45 metre in width along with associated facilities for all weather and night operation of big body aircraft. For this, 278 acre of land of SAIL and 44 acre of private land are required.
Similarly, for expansion of RSP from the present 4.5 MTPA to 9.3 MTPA, the government needs to remove encroachment on 1,200 acre of SAIL land.