Bengal government to set up industrial township in backward district; project to generate 1.5 lakh jobs, says Amit Mitra

Kolkata: If elections are round the corner, can investment and employment generation pitch be far behind?

Taking off from where West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee left on February 5 while presenting the vote-on-account, finance and industry minister Amit Mitra on Wednesday outlined the details of an industrial township that would generate employment opportunities for 1.5 lakh people.

The proposed township would be located in Raghunathpur in the backward district of Purulia about 250 km to the worth west of Kolkata and would be spread on 2,483 acre, said the minister while addressing a conclave of the Confederation of Indian Industry.

Mitra said that the industrial park would be ideal for metallurgical processing units, cement units, engineering, refractories, ceramics, manufacture of electrical/electronic equipment and auto components.

“It would be a game changer project,” said Mitra. He remarked that the plan took him to his young days when the government drew up a blueprint to build Salt Lake that later burgeoned into the IT hub of the state and a thriving middle-upper middle class township.

The land has been carved out of a parcel of 2,666 acre that was earmarked for a freight corridor from Punjab to Dankuni. “The state government set this land aside for the freight corridor. But since there was no progress, we decided to utilise the land to set up this township. The chief minister did not want to wait,” stated Mitra.

Odhisha mines closure to hit Bengal companies

Earlier, Mitra said a recent notification by the Centre has resulted in a closure of a number of merchant mines in Odisha and has deprived dozens of user industries in West Bengal, adding that chief minister Mamata Banerjee will take it up at the highest level of the government to find a way out of the problem.

“As many as 21 merchant mines have closed in Odisha and as a result user industries in West Bengal are in trouble since iron from these mines are used as the main raw material in these units. The chief minister is disturbed over this and she will take it up at the highest level of the government. We can’t accept it,” Mitra told an audience that comprised the chambers of commerce of the south Bengal districts of East Burdwan, West Burdwan, Birbhum, Bankura, Purulia and Jhargram.

Only big companies such as SAIL and the Tatas that have captive mines now, Mitra remarked.

Almost 70% of India’s steel plants operate without captive iron ore sources. These are dependent on captive mines and the mines in Odisha and Jharkhand supply around 45% of the raw material requirement in the eastern region of the country.

“These mines used to supply 40 million tonnes of iron ore annually to the units in Bengal. But it has now reduced to only five million tonnes,” claimed Mitra.