Virtually halted industries of Jharkhand may now breathe easy as the State Government has agreed in-principle to set up a local 'project monitoring group' (PMG) in the lines of one already functional under the Cabinet Secretariat in Delhi.
The cell would provide solution to the troubled industries in the mineral-rich State by establishing a web-based inter-departmental platform so that statuary clearances related to land, water, forest and also concerning law and order can be resolved under a stipulated timeframe.
Informing about the decision, Anil Swarup, Additional Secretary at the Centre who is also chairing the PMG after it came into existence in June, 2013, said that his talks with Chief Secretary RS Sharma had been fruitful. "It is very significant and I am happy to inform you that the State Government has agreed for a state-level PMG. I have invited a team of officials from here to come and study the portal we use for making coordination among various ministries. After all, there should be someone to hear the problems of the projects of below Rs 500 crore of investment," said Swarup on Tuesday in his interaction with industry magnets of Jharkhand organised by CII.
The unit at the Centre takes up projects cleared by the Cabinet Committee of Investment proposing to invest capital over Rs 1,000 crore. Since its inception, it has facilitated in clearing nearly 127 projects out of about 407 came before it in the want of various clearances. The projects came to vouch investment of over Rs 18 lakh crore spread throughout the country.
When formed, Jharkhand would be the seventh state to have the mechanism in place. It holds significance for the State when majority of the power, mining and steel projects are stuck in the want of various clearances. The bottlenecks have made the industry heavyweights to develop cold feet about their future investment plans in the State as many are forced to postpone their announced date for becoming functional. This is also causing lots of resentments among financers who have now started pressurising the firms.
"We have in place 12 sub-groups at PMG for the purpose. It is also about zeal to find out solution collectively. If the system and industry people come together with genuine intentions anything is possible. We have stressed on complete transparency, file tracking and fixed timelines to work," he added and counted on the land clearances, law and order and forest and environment as major hurdles across the nation including Jharkhand in getting projects cleared.
He also advised the industry people to approach the PMG with summary of their problems so that the request can be flagged to the concerned ministries and also come in the defense of "honest officials" if wrong allegations were leveled related to any project in question.
"You should also muster the courage to come in public if you are aware that any official is being wrongly framed. Now-a-days even bona-fide decisions are being questioned. Industry should come to defend and encourage honest officials. Positive energy should flow. This sort of climate has to be changed in the country," said Swarup and admitted that hue and cry about scams had slowed down the things, "but I don't call it policy paralysis."
Talking about shortage of coal and growing dependency over imports the official said that if railway line projects like Shivpuri-Tori in Jharkhand and Jharsuguda-Barbil get cleared, we will not face shortage of coal. "Fuel supply agreement for power projects with 78,000 MW capacity has been signed but unable to go ahead due to lack of coal. To my mind, problem lies equally at the doorsteps of the Centre and State," he said.
Industry majors like Essar Power, Tata Power, Tata Steel, JSPl raised their concerns over land related acts such as CNT and SPT, non-digitised land records, CAMPA provisions etc.
Under CAMPA provisions private sectors have to purchase land equal to the forest land allocated to it and hand it over to the department while the PSUs are exempted with just paying the cost. "It has been under consideration and in some projects the government has purchased land from its own. But these are policy decisions," he said. PNS n Ranchi