Members of North India Council of Churches at the Posco plant site in Jagatsinghpur. Telegraph picture

Paradip, July 12: Forced to have a strategy rethink in the face of multiple stumbling blocks, Jagatsinghpur district administration today suspended the project-related work and land acquisition process in the Posco project area.

To work out the strategy for smooth project-related work in the days to come, officials are learnt to have taken a day’s break to deliberate over the emerging hurdles.

“On directions from higher authorities, we did not carry on the project-related work today. The inadequate police arrangement was however the principal reason for cancellation of work,” said additional district magistrate Saroj Kanta Choudhury.

“As a meeting of officials involved in the land acquisition work was scheduled earlier, the project work was put on hold today,” said special land acquisitions officer Nrusingha Charan Swain.

Official sources informed that various issues that have come up since the resumption of land acquisition process on May 18 were discussed today to ensure smooth project work.

“As committed earlier, the six-charter of demands for revision in livelihood support and compensation package would have to be fulfilled shortly. The administration had assured in writing that the demands would be met after the return car festival. Besides, issues like the continued dharna and human barricades in Gobindapur had come up for discussion. We also deliberated on whether there is any need to use force to lift the agitators,” said an official.

Meanwhile, delegates of the North India Council of Churches visited the project villages today to make an on-the-spot assessment of plight of local settlers facing imminent displacement.

General secretary of the council of churches Roger Gaekwad, who led the team, said: “Basic right to livelihood is being violated in project villages. Fearing police crackdown, villagers in areas such as Dhinkia and Gobindapur are virtually living under house arrest. The demands for relocation of the project are just and reasonable as they are being squeezed out from their land and their permanent sources of income are being snatched away. The churches’ council stands behind the communities’ resistance movement for life, livelihood and identity.”

Besides the churches’ body, a team of media persons from South Korea made rounds of the project villages. The suspension of project-related work has fuelled suspicion that the administration preferred to suspend project work today to get away from the glare of South Korean media.