* At Lanjigarh, 65-year-old Luhudi Sikhaka, the tribal priest of Niyam Raja, the deity of the Dongaria Kondhs, does not want to part with his land to the Vedanta group for its alumina complex. His consideration, unlike his fellow tribesmen, is not religion. His two sons-in-law have already sold off their land to the multinational company. They have squandered away the compensation, mostly on liquor, and today, they work as coolies at the plant site, virtually begging for daily wage jobs. “I do not want that to happen to me or my family members. I don’t want my grandchildren to end up becoming coolies. We are better off now,” says Luhudi.

*At Polang village in Gada Kujanga, in coastal Jagatsinghpur district, 42-year-old Meena Hembram, a gram panchayat member, eagerly waits for Posco to set up its mega steel project. Meena, belonging to the Santhal tribe and who migrated from the Nilgiri Hills to Balasore in the 70s, was one of the first few farmers to voluntarily surrender her land where she grew betel vines for the proposed plant. “Posco will usher in development. My family members will get jobs in its plant,” says Meena.

Bhubaneswar, Sept. 8: The distance between the two big-ticket projects of Orissa — Vedanta Alumina’s Lanjigarh, in backward Kalahandi, and Posco’s Nuagan in Jagatsinghpur — is around 650km. The terrain is different, as is the profile of the people living in the two areas.

People in the proposed Posco plant area belong to the affluent coastal belt that virtually controls the levers of the state’s politics, bureaucracy and the economy. The Vedanta unit happens to be in the tribal-dominated Kalahandi district, which is part of the KBK (Koraput-Bolangir-Kalahandi) region — better known as the hunger bowl of India for often hitting headlines for its backwardness and now, of course, for red terror.

The two projects may be separated by the 600-odd kilometres but have a lot in common. They figure high in chief minister Naveen Patnaik’s prescription for the mineral-rich but backward Orissa. His industrial vision, during his nearly 10 years of rule, has attracted Rs 6 lakh crore in private capital in the form of 50 steel units, 27 thermal power stations, four alumina plants and six ports. He has been on an MoU-signing spree since 2002, but not a single big-ticket project seems to be making expected progress.

Naveen’s cup of woes is overflowing with the Union environment and forests ministry slamming the brakes on Vedanta and Posco for alleged violation of environment laws.

Pitted against the might of the UPA-ruled Centre and Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi, who addressed a tribal rally at Lanjigarh, Naveen seems rattled. He skipped the Orissa Banchao rally of his party at Lanjigarh on September 3, though it was supposed to be the ruling Biju Janata Dal’s (BJD) answer to Rahul trying to lure away the tribals.

For Naveen, Orissa’s first non-Congress chief minister to win a third consecutive term in office, this could well be the turning point of his political career that began with a by-election victory in Aska in 1997.

More than five years after South Korean steel major Posco signed an MoU with the government, its Rs 52,000-crore project is yet to make any headway.

The company, facing a popular agitation and the wrath of the Union environment ministry for alleged violation of green laws, is yet to take possession of a single inch of land at its project site. To make things worse, Orissa High Court last month rejected the state’s recommendation for granting a prospecting (exploration) licence to the company over 2,500 hectares of the Khandadhar iron ore mines in tribal-dominated Sundergarh.

The world’s largest steel maker, ArcelorMittal, is also finding land acquisition for its Rs 40,000-crore project in Keonjhar district an uphill task. The pace of land acquisition for industries has been extremely slow, with only around 15,000 acres of the over 45,000 acres required for various projects taken over so far.

“Recent developments are bound to affect the investment climate in the state. Unless the state and the Centre work in sync, industrialisation is going to suffer,” said industries minister Raghunath Mohanty.

What worries the ruling party more is that the Congress, which has been out of power for nearly a decade in the state, has smelt an opportunity in Naveen’s troubles.

Buoyed by the success of Rahul’s Lanjigarh rally, state Congress workers expect Rahul to launch a similar campaign in the coastal belt. But this region, where Posco is setting up its 12-million-tonne plant, is neither tribal-dominated nor a Congress stronghold like Kalahandi, of which Lanjigarh is a part. Rahul may balk at the prospect of leading such a campaign there but if he agrees, he will be throwing a challenge to Naveen.

Naveen, say critics, has been winning virtually by default, with the Congress ceasing to play the role of an effective Opposition. “The Congress, in fact, has been working as an agent of the BJD in Orissa,” says former BJP MP Kharvela Swain.

Although the Congress seems in a mood to make amends for the past, much depends on whether Rahul agrees to take up the challenge of a campaign in the coastal belt, which accounts for almost 69 (around 47 per cent) of the 147 Assembly seats.

Aware of their limitations, state Congress leaders desperately want Rahul to lead the battle. “The party does not have a leader to match Naveen’s charisma. People are yet to forgive us for selling dreams,”conceded a Congress leader.

A powerful section in the Congress feels that the party can stage a comeback if it decides to take Naveen head on over industrialisation, like Mamata Banerjee did against a similar drive by the ruling CPM in Bengal. “The party should have no dearth of issues, with land acquisition invariably sparking tension and several flash points like Posco and Vedanta ready to explode,” says social activist Siddhartha Nayak.

Agriculture minister and BJD general secretary Damodar Rout disagrees. “The people of Orissa will never forgive the Congress for becoming a stumbling block to the state’s progress. They (the Congress leaders) lack the credibility to face the people who are craving for industrialisation. The party is digging its own grave by opposing industrialisation.”

As the Congress chalks out its strategy, Naveen is planning a counter-attack. He has decided to target the Congress-led UPA over the Polavaram multi-purpose project in neighbouring Andhra Pradesh. “The Congress is least bothered about the fact that it will affect 11 villages of Orissa,” says Rout.

With the war of nerves between the Congress and the BJD intensifying, it remains to be seen how Naveen responds to the first real challenge to his uninterrupted reign.