Facelift in store

Jamshedpur, Aug. 23: With barely three days to go for the Tata Steel centenary celebrations, speculations are running high as to what would make the steel major’s first step into the new century special for the town.

A senior Tata Steel official, on condition of anonymity, said: “The managing director would gift something very special to the steel city on this day like the Jubilee Park which was the gift on the 50th anniversary.”

Though the take-off of the first commercial flight from the city is official now, speculations are high that the steel major would gift a planetarium to the steel city on its 100th birthday.

Although officials within Tata Steel are tight-lipped on the issue, sources confirm that managing director B. Muthuraman would make a special announcement on August 26 as the celebrations kick off.

As the preparations reach its peak, talks are on that a new shopping mall would also be built near Bistupur, close to the slag dumping grounds, in partnership with Forum, a Calcutta-based shopping mall. The construction of the Jusco project would begin soon.

The proposed mall is, however, coming up next to the first-ever multiplex in the city built by filmmaker Prakash Jha, which is under construction. Adlabs Films are the official partners for the multiplex.

Initially, the dumping grounds in Bistupur were to be converted into a park but the plan has been stalled for now, officials said.

Contrary to the hype, officials said that the celebrations would be an extremely low-key affair, reasons for which are not yet known.

“We will have a formal cake-cutting ceremony at the Centre of Excellence, after which the MD would launch the centenary website that has been designed by the corporate communications department,” said a source.

The new Founders’ gallery would also be inaugurated. “We have made some minor changes in the gallery. A few new pillars have been added and more has been written on each panel. Various agencies have worked hard to add value to this gallery,” said an official.

However, no information is available on the event. Though there were talks that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh would be the chief guest at the occasion, sources confirmed that the proposed visit has been cancelled.

Names of the revised board of directors would be announced on August 26. Some Corus officials are likely to make it to the directors’ list. Senior Tata Steel officials from Mumbai and Calcutta are also likely to arrive.

Other plans for Tata Steel include decoration of city hotspots, launch of a safety policy in the wake of the year, being declared the safety year and cultural events.