House Panels no to Sindol a big blow

BHUBANESWAR: The report of the Assembly Committee, headed by Speaker Pradip Amat, recommending scrapping of the Sindol project has come as a big jolt for the State Government which is in the firing line of the Opposition on other issues also. The committee comprised only BJD members  as the Opposition boycotted it in view of the stiff opposition to the project by the locals. Besides the Speaker, Health and Family Welfare Minister Prasanna Acharya, Food Supplies and Consumer Welfare Minister Niranjan Pujari, former minister Padmanabha Behera and BJD legislator Bhagaban Kanhar were members of the Committee. Sources said all the members were opposed to the project from the beginning as it would have submerged villages in their area. With the panchayat elections round the corner, no BJD leader wanted to take the risk by supporting the project which did not have local support. The Committee was unanimous that the project should be scrapped. Behera said it is now for the State Government to announce its decision in the House taking into account the Assembly Committee’s recommendation. The Speaker had directed the State Government in the last session not to go ahead with the project till the House Committee gave its recommendations. The Committee was constituted after protests by the Congress and the BJP in the Assembly and outside. The Sindol project was to affect 43,461 people belonging to 798 families in 60 villages. NHPC and OHPC had signed an MoU to jointly implement three hydel power projects in the State at an estimated cost of ` 2,600 crore. The three hydel power projects __ Sindol-I (100 MW), Sindol-II (100 MW) and Sindol-III (120 MW) __ having a total capacity of 320 MW were expected to be commissioned in four to five years. Farmers of three Western Odisha districts __ Boudh, Sonepur and Sambalpur __ are strongly opposed to the project. The project was scrapped several times in the past because of strong opposition from the locals who feared submergence of large tracts of agricultural land and several villages. Opposition parties alleged that while campaigning for the 2003 Rairakhol bypoll Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik had assured not to implement the project.