Industry min's power likely to be curtailed

Mumbai: A proverbial ball of a decision on land acquisition for the Nanar green refinery project has landed in the court of Chief minister Devendra Fadnavis.

Industry minister Subhash Desai directed the additional chief secretary of the Industry Department Sunil Porwal to cancel the land acquisition notification for the project. Mr Porwal has sent the proposal for Mr Fadnavis’ approval.

The power of the industry minister to de-notify the land acquisition for Maharashtra Industrial Development Corpor-ation (MIDC) projects may be curtailed, senior officials say.

Mr Desai announced the cancellation of the land acquisition in Nanar and asked Mr Porwal to start the de-notification process. The industries department has a high-power committee under the additional chief secretary (industries) for MIDC land acquisition.

If any land has to be acquired for MIDC, the proposal needs to be get sanctioned by this committee. Additional chief secretaries of finance, planning and urban development department are members of the committee. When the MIDC land was de-notified and released, this committee was not consulted.

After the opposition raised allegations of de-notifying MIDC land against Mr Desai, the chief minister appointed an inquiry committee of Me L.P. Bakshi, a retired additional chief secretary. This committee blamed the practice of not consulting the committee while de-notifying such land. Mr Fadnavis tabled the report of the Bakshi committee in the recent budget session of the state legislature, which accepted the recommendations.

The Nanar refinery project belongs to the Union government and the role of the state is limited to land acquisition. The high-power committee headed by the chief secretary was appointed permanently for state-run projects and its recommendations are not binding on the government. So the Nanar issue was not dealt by this committee and the land acquisition or de-notifying of the MIDC lands were never sent to this committee, the officials said.