Orissa – A land of opportunities

I thought of writing something on Orissa, as people around me haven’t known much about it. Some think its one of the north-eastern states – I was really surprised when my friends used to call me Assamese (they used to think Assam is just next to Orissa). And my friends at Delhi used to think Orissa is South India.

Confusion about its location is just the beginning of the problem. People perceive Orissa as a land of famine, malnutrition, problems here and there. And it becomes worse when I say I was born in Bolangir, part of the KBK (Kalahandi–Bolangir–Koraput) trio, infamously known as “country’s hunger zone”.

While the state government is leaving no stone unturned to make the state a new destination for industrial investment, the ghost of KBK still casts an overpowering shadow on the development potential Orissa holds.

To substantiate my point, I would quickly take you through some of the lesser-known facts about Orissa.-

Bhubaneswar, the State capital, is the 2nd best planned city in the country after Chandigarh. Anybody can fall in love with the wide roads and greenery within the city. It is a power surplus State (yes you read it right I said SURPLUS); the first in the country to initiate reforms & privatize the sector. It also sells power to its neighboring states.

Orissa is also called the mining hub of India, According to All India Mineral Resources Estimates, If you look at the total deposits of minerals such as chromite, nickel, cobalt, bauxite and iron-ore, more than 50% (and in some cases even 90%) of these deposits are in Orissa. I never knew Orissa was so rich still wonder why it is called one of the poorest states.

IT Sector

After the IT –BPO boom in cities like Bangalore and Delhi, Orissa is coming up in a big way as the preferred location for many of India's topmost IT firms like Satyam, TCS, MindTree Consulting, Hexaware Technologies, PricewaterhouseCoopers and Infosys which have large branches in Orissa. IBM, Syntel, Bosch and Wipro are setting up development centers in Orissa. Two of the S&P CNX 500 conglomerates - National Aluminum and Tata Sponge Iron have corporate offices in Orissa.

There are some upcoming IT parks in Orissa. Major are ‘Info Park’ - creation of 4.2 million square feet of built-up space, to be developed by DLF and accorded SEZ approval. And ‘Knowledge Industry Township’ - 784 acres integrated township located 15 kms from Bhubaneswar, to comprise an SEZ, residential, educational, commercial areas and business zones which will be extended to 1500 acres in Phase-I and 4000 acres to be further added in phase-II.

Education

Education industry has become the sunrise sector of Orissa. It is now the hub of engineering, management and medical education in Central & Eastern India. With the presence of large number of highly ranked schools like NIT Rourkela, KIIT Bhubaneswar, IIIT Bhubaneswar, UCE Burla (talks on for making it an IIT) and XIM Bhubaneswar. Also Orissa has around 18 Medical colleges with AIIMS coming up with a campus at Bhubaneswar. Some new Institutes like BIT, Dhirubhai Ambani Institute of Information and Communication Technology are also coming up.

Students from Chattisgarh, West Bengal, Bihar, Jharkhand, M.P., etc flock to Orissa for higher education and this is not limited to big cities like Rourkela & Bhubaneswar, a town called Bargarh (where I stay now) – with a population of not more than 90000, has a school which has a total intake of 3000 students of which more than 50% are not from Orissa.

Tourism

Orissa has several popular tourist destinations. Puri, with the Jagannatha's temple near the sea, and the Sun Temple at Konark, are visited by thousands of people every year. Puri is like the second Goa. I believe better air connectivity and some more promotion by the Orissa tourism board can work wonders for this city. Chilika Lake, a brackish water coastal lake on the Bay of Bengal is the largest coastal lake in India. The Chilika Lake Bird Sanctuary, which harbors over 150 migratory and resident species of birds, is another place of tourist attraction.

One of the greatest attractions of Orissa is still its vast expanses of unspoiled natural landscape that offer a protected yet natural habitat to the state’s incredible wildlife. There are many wildlife sanctuaries in Orissa, major ones are the Simlipal National Park Tiger Reserve & the Bhitarkanika Wildlife Sanctuary. Tourism industry is largely an untapped industry for the whole of Orissa. A little more pro activeness is required on the part of the government to build a place for Orissa on the tourist hot spot list.

Industrialization

A 15 mtpa mega petrochemical complex is being built by IOC at an investment of $6 billion. 10 proposals for 25,000 MW capacities power are under consideration by the Government of $ 22 Billion. Proposal for National Gas Grid and Coal Gasification is mooted jointly by Reliance and GAIL with an investment of $ 2 billion. Major expansion of the Paradip Port has been planned. Also 3 new ports of total investment of $ 1.35 billion have been sanctioned at Dhamra, Gopalpur and Jatadhari Muhan. The government of India and the state government of Orissa would work together to erect world class infrastructure in this region along the lines of the Rotterdam, Houston, and Pudong regions.

Cities like Jharsuguda, Keonjhar & Angul are attracting huge investments. I would tell more about Angul, a town around Central Orissa.

Angul - Large scale steel giants like Jindal Group, Bhusan Steel are establishing their respective plants in the vicinity of Angul. Also are Monnet Ispat and Energy Ltd, Kalinga Coal Mining Ltd, Tata Sponge, Rugta Mines, Utkal Coal Ltd At Talcher, 15 kms from Angul, industries like NTPC, Fertilizer Corporation of India, MCL are situated. Talcher is well known for its huge coal mines and National Thermal Power Plant NALCO Nagar This is the place where Asia’s largest aluminum smelter plant is situated. That is why this place is called Nalco Nagar.

A list of companies investing/invested into Orissa

1. Vedanta
2. Arcelor Mittal
3. Reliance Power
4. NTPC
5. Tata Sponge
6. Jindal
7. Bhushan
8. Monnet Ispat
9. JSW
10. Tata Power
11. UMPP
12. Sterlite Energy
13. Neyveli Lignite
14. CESC
15. GMR Energy

Some major news of Orissa worth mentioning

· The state's GDP grew at 9.53% between 1999-2000 and 2005-2006 to reach US$ 14.08 billion

• In steel sector, 36 projects for over 43 mtpa of steel with more than US$30 Bn investment coming up in Orissa.
• Reliance Industries (Anil Ambani Group) is putting up the world's largest power plant with an investment of US $13 billion at Hirma in Jharsuguda district.
• Vedanta has also announced a $3.2 billion dollar huge private University project on the lines of the Ivy League Universities, which is unprecedented in the history of education in India.
• Tatas budget hotel chain Ginger is expected to open hotels in Paradip and Konark by the end of 2008. They are also planning to come up with a Ginger hotel in industrial towns like Jharsuguda, Angul and Kalinga Nagar by 2009 end.
• The State Government will give Reliance Retail six bus stands of the State on a lease for a period of 33 years. The money will from the lease will be used for plying 50 new buses and setting up bus stands in Bhubaneswar, Cuttack, Sambalpur, Rourkela and Angul on a PPP mode.
• The Central Government has agreed to accord SEZ (Special Economic Zone) status to eight sites in Orissa, among which are Infocity at Bhubaneswar and Paradip.

Lot of facts and figures can be quoted, but that’s not the idea. Just think about the wave of development that spreads when one big industry is set up. For example, If Vedanta gives direct employment to 7000 people, think of housing, schools, hospitals, markets, etc that needs to be developed for the 7000 families that come in. It starts a spiraling effect, disposable income increases, purchasing power increases, demand increases and hence the economy of Orissa will grow. I can see a lot of industries like the real estate, automobiles (trucks & tractors) for mining, hospitality, ancillary units which support the bigger industries, etc booming already.

The passion for going the entrepreneur way, planning king-size ventures, radical moves and the risk taking ability to think out of the box is lacking in the state. The government and the people of Orissa need to take the initiative come together and work for a better Orissa. They need to think bigger than petty issues like changing the name of “Orissa” to “Odisa”.

“Orissa has a long way to go – Orissa shining”.

- By Akhil Agrawal : akhil.imt@gmail.com

- Chief Editor : Aditi Gulati aditi.333@gmail.com

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