The Jagatsinghpur district administration appears to be inching closer to make the long-awaited Posco steel project near here a reality as it began digging a trench at the proposed plant site at Gobindpur village on Thursday.
The trench is needed for construction of a boundary wall in the Patnahat and Mangalapada areas of Govindpur. The land acquisition process for the South Korean steel major’s project is nearly complete.
Despite resistance from the anti-Posco brigade, the administration pressed into service excavating machineries to continue the work before it was stopped due to the intense heat wave conditions.
Meanwhile, members of the Posco Pratirodh Sangram Samiti (PPSS), which has been spearheading the agitation against the country’s single-largest FDI venture, threatened to move the Odisha High Court against the recent activities of the administration.
“We’ll appeal to the High Court for a stay on the trench cutting work. We’ll not allow the officials to continue work here,” said a PPSS member. On Monday, the district administration had drawn a demarcation line of the boundary wall of the project site at Gobindapur.