The shutdown of the Vedanta’s 1-million-tonne-per-annum alumina refinery at Lanjigarh in Kalahandi district on Wednesday is considered as a black day in the history of industrialisation in Odisha.
How can one explain to the world that the plant was closed down due to want of bauxite in view of the fact that Odisha possesses about 1,800 million tonnes of bauxite accounting for about 50 per cent of the total reserve of this mineral in the country? A big irony indeed, remark industrial circles.
Odisha boasts of having about 20 bauxite mines, but none of them except the public-sector Nalco’s captive mine at Panchpatmali in Koraput district is operational.
The Vedanta's Lanjigarh plant was linked with the bauxite deposits of the Niyamgiri mines through a joint venture arrangement between the State-owned Odisha Mining Corporation (OMC) and the Vedanta Group company Sterlite Industries (India) Ltd. The project, however, faced problem as the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) withdrew the forest clearances accorded to it on the ground that the Forest Right Act has not been implemented properly. As the matter is being dragged in law court, the plant starved of the raw material.
As the efforts of the Vedanta to continue to import bauxite from Gujarat, Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand to keep its plant operational failed, the company had no other way than to shut down the plant. The mines in Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand are in trouble because of the statutory restrictions imposed on them recently. Sourcing bauxite from Gujarat also became difficult as that State is now under the election process.
“With bauxite stock depleting to almost ‘zero level’, the company is left with no other alternative but to shut down the refinery, whose closure is expected to affect around 7,000 people engaged directly or indirectly with the plant,” said company sources. “In spite of the company’s top management having several rounds of meetings and discussions with the State Chief Minister and Chief Secretary for bauxite provision to the refinery, no concrete solution has been be arrived upon,” the sources added.
A frustrated CEO of Vedanta Aluminium Limited (VAL) Mukesh Kumar said, “Despite our concerted efforts over the past three months to ensure sustainable supplies of bauxite for our Lanjigarh refinery, we have not been able to find any solution.”
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