South Korean President Park Geun-Hye is likely to skip the Odisha leg of her India visit this month as there has been little progress in Posco project in the State.
Park is scheduled to visit India with a high-level business delegation on January 15. She is to meet Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. The business delegation is expected to hold a dialogue with Indian businessmen on issues of mutual cooperation.
South Korean Ambassador Joon-gyu lee, during his visit to Odisha October, had said Park might visit the State to launch the South Korea-headquartered Posco’s project during her visit to India.
There is no information about South Korean President’s visit to the State, a senior official of the State’s Home Department said on Thursday.
Posco’s proposed 12-million-tonnes-per-annum steel plant, the single-largest foreign direct investment (FDI) in India, is to come up near Paradip. For this purpose, the State Government had signed an MoU with the company on June 22, 2005, which was valid for five years. The agreement has not yet been renewed.
The State Government has claimed that it has acquired 2,700 acres of land required by Posco to start construction for the first phase of the project (8 million tonnes per annum).
Except for the construction of an about one-km-long boundary wall, there has been no other progress on the ground.