The plot of land on which the proposed Foundry Park will come up, off National Highway 6. Picture by Sanjoy Chattopadhyaya

Coming up, is a pollution-free foundry park, with all infrastructural and logistic support, in Howrah.

The bhoomi puja of the park, on Ranihati-Amta Road, five km from National Highway 6, was performed on Sunday. The park will be developed on 2,800 bighas, of which 932 bighas have been acquired from farmers at Rs 1.25 lakh per bigha.

The project is being implemented with help from the state industrial development corporation and with financial assistance from the Centre under the Industrial Infrastructure Upgrade Scheme.

Initially, 140 units will be allotted land. Around 2,000 bighas will be allotted to set up foundry units and the rest have been earmarked for common facilities, including a 220 KV/132 KV power station and three 33 KV substations.

There will also be an effluent treatment plant, a sewerage treatment plant, waterworks, a telecom centre, a post office, a police station, a fire station, petrol pumps, a guest house, a medical centre and a commercial hub.

The foundry-owners will provide supportive facilities, like a weigh bridge, a raw material-processing unit, a fabrication shop, a tool room, an assembly shop and an industrial training institute.

The units will employ around a lakh workers and the initial production will be a million tonnes annually.

The five-km road from National Highway 6 to the park will be converted into a four-lane road.

?The 350 units on Beneras Road, in Howrah, now manufacture six lakh tonnes of mould iron annually,? said S.C. Dugur, chairman, Indian Foundry Association (IFA). ?But the demand for mould iron is so high that we need to manufacture at least two million tonnes annually. So, even after we start production at the foundry park, we will not be able to produce as much mould iron as required.?

S.S. Kejriwal, chairman of the foundry park subcommittee of IFA, said: ?We failed to modernise our units on Beneras Road for want of space. And the machines are all obsolete. In the foundry park, we will instal state-of-the-art, high-pressure moulding machines to double the production. As the demand for mould iron in the international market is high, we have no option but to modernise the units.?

In 1995-96, the state pollution control board had moved court against the owners of foundry units after they refused to instal pollution control equipment.

The Supreme Court had asked the district authorities to close down the units that refused to instal the equipment. Following the directive, the IFA decided to set up the foundry park.