A government committee fixed at Rs 1,700 crore rent and salami to be paid by Tata Steel for leasing out as many as 59 plots in Jamshedpur in violation of sub-lease clauses, but the company disagreed with the figure, calling for a wider classification of land, currently limited to only residential and commercial categories.
The appropriate machinery committee (AMC), looking into Tata Steel's adherence of sub-lease clauses, deliberated for over three hours on Tuesday to arrive at the figure that was based on rates fixed by the government in January.
"We were directed by the state revenue and land reform department to categorise lands for which the sub-lease allotments were done by Tata Steel and also calculate the salami (net amount paid for acquisition of leasehold rights on a plot of land) and yearly land rent. We categorised the land into commercial and residential types and calculated the salami and rent to the tune of Rs 1,700 crore for all 59 plots," East Singhbhum deputy commissioner Amit Kumar said, adding that they would submit a report to the state government within a week along with the objections raised by Tata Steel.
Tuesday's meeting, sources in the district administration said, was to regularise sub-lease violations by charging extra from Tata Steel. Violations, they explained, were in cases where, for instance, a lessee took permission to open a hotel on a plot but built a shopping mall.
According to the deputy commissioner, Tata Steel objected to levying of salami for sub-leased plots and also requested that land categories be increased from current residential and commercial.
"Tata Steel expressed their objections against payment of salami and also suggested that several sub-lease plots were being used for purposes other than commercial or residential, like, for instance, educational, social and religious. Therefore, the company wanted to increase the ambit of land categories," Kumar said.
Among those who attended the meeting, chaired by Kumar at the district collectorate, were joint secretary in the revenue and land reforms department Uday Pratap Singh, East Singhbhum ADC Sunil Kumar Singh, district land acquisition officer Akhileshwar Prasad, Tata Steel vice-president (corporate services) Sunil Bhaskaran, chief of corporate services Rituraj Sinha and Tata Steel legal head Meena Lal.
Between 2006 and 2011, after the state government renewed the Tata Steel lease in 2005, 59 parties had been granted sub-lease by the district administration with approval of the AMC.
Most investors took up plots to set up malls, market-cum-office complexes, hotels, parking lots, technical institutions, religious institutions and small industries.
But problems arose in 2012 when the then land and revenue minister, Mathura Prasad, said the sub-leases had been allotted "unfairly" because of which the state would lose out on revenue. In September 2012, then chief minister Arjun Munda stopped all constructions and ordered a probe on the allotments.
Several entities moved Jharkhand High Court, challenging the state government notification to stop construction work on sub-leased plots in Jamshedpur in 2013. The matter is still in court.
Last year, the CAG also claimed that the Tata Steel's sub-leasing of plots had led to loss of revenue to the state exchequer.
