Developers to take over Nayachar islands today

Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee will preside over the signing ceremony that will take place at the Writers’ Building on Friday.

Prasun Mukherjee of Unitech Universal, which is one of the partners of the joint venture, today met Bhattacharjee and discussed the project. He, however, refused to divulge the details.

“The PCRCC is a joint venture company in which the WBIDC of the state government has 49 per cent stake and the New Kolkata International Development (NKID) has 51 per cent share,” M V Rao, Managing Director of the WBIDC, told The Indian Express.

The NKID comprises groups like Salim Group of Indonesia and Delhi-based Universal Unitech.

Meanwhile, a six-member expert committee, appointed by the state government to advise it on setting up of a chemical hub at Nayachar, will visit the islands on February 25. Incidentally this will be the first visit of the high-powered committee, headed by Subir Raha, former chairman of ONGC, to the islands, which are situated around 40 kms from Haldia in East Midnapore district.

“We are going to make an on-the-spot assessment of the area. This will be followed by out meeting at Haldia on February 26 where we will decide on our next course of action,” Siddhartha Dutta, pro-vice chancellor of Jadavpur University, also the convenor of the committee, told The Indian Express.

This will be the second time that the committee will meet. It has already said that it would depend on its own means for conducting its survey of the islands, which is now under the commerce and industries department of the state government.