Malkangiri people extend support to Dalmia cement plant facility

By A Iswar Rao

Malkangiri, March 13: A ray of hope has emerged for Dalmia company’s proposed cement plant in Odisha’s Malkangiri district as it got conditional support of the local people in a public hearing conducted by the district administration on Saturday.

On Saturday, the district administration had conducted a public hearing for environmental clearance of the proposed cement facility at Kattamateru under Motu tehsil limits. Over one thousand people from the various villages of Mattapakka, Niliguda and Sikhpally attended the meeting. The attending villagers extended their conditional support to the cement factory. However, they demanded like em-ployment, healthcare, road connectivity and other facilities for land losers.

Irma Madkami, a resident of Pumaguda village stated that many affected villagers, especially those who are illiterate, want assurance that their demands will be met once the project gets clearance.

Another youth Anand Sodi of Orkelguda village said the project will be beneficial for the people only if unemployed youths get jobs at the factory.

“The company must address ourcore issues like health, employment and education,” he said.

Addressing affected villagers, deputy executive director of Dalmia Cement SK Rout said clarified all issues have been clarified. The company will soon set up two Jio towers for mobile connectivity and pro-vide ambulance service for vil-lagers. “We will go ahead with people’s support and do the needful for villagers,” he said. The plant will have an annual production capacity of 3 million tonne.

Additional District Magistrate (ADM) Birasen Pradhan, Pollution Control Board regional officer Prashant Kar and Rout were present at the public hearing.

Around 20 platoons of police were deployed around the venue. Dalmia Cement Bharat Lim-ited got the bid for Kattamateru limestone mine after a tender was floated by Odisha government earlier.

 The plant is proposed to come up over 801.171 hectare (ha) land, informed Malkangiri divisional forest officer (DFO) Pratap Kottapalli.