World’s richest Indian, steel magnate Lakshmi Niwas Mittal may give priority to Karnataka amongst his various investment plans in India. Mr. Mittal has signed an MoU with the Government of Karnataka for setting up a 6 million ton integrated steel plant and a 750 mw power plant in Bellary. This was a part of the ongoing Global Investor’s Meet in Bengaluru, aimed at drawing in investors to the state.
“Although we have explored investment opportunities in Jharkhand and Orissa way before approaching Karnataka, the strong commitment, support and positive attitude of this Govt gives me great confidence that it will see speedy implementation,” Mr. Mittal said. Arcelor Mittal currently has two large projects planned in Orissa and Jharkhand, with a capacity to produce 12 million tons of steel each. However, both the projects have been stuck in various regulatory hurdles for some time. “While there are many issues of land acquisition, environmental concerns etc in Jharkhand and Orissa, I do not see any problems arising in Karnataka. And if approvals are faster here then the Bellary project will be topmost on our priority list,” Mr. Mittal said.
The company has already received the land required for the project, and has paid for it. Some issues, such as a mining lease from the central government, are still be resolved.
However, Mr. Mittal was confident that the project could be executed as early as 36 months.
Steel seems to be the flavour of the investors meet as four of the largest proposals inked today were for steel projects with captive power. This includes the Arcelor Mittal investment, which is pegged at Rs 30,000 crore.
The three other projects are from Bramhani Industries Karnataka, Bhushan Steel and Surya Vijaynagar Steel & Power. In all, these projects add up to Rs 1.18 lakh crore.