Wednesday, July 12 2006 17:14 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Bhubaneswar: The Orissa Government has set up an eight-member panel to do the groundwork for the proposed Arcelor-Mittal 12 million-tonne steel plant, official said Wednesday.

The state government has formed a joint working group headed by state chief secretary Subash Pani, a senior official of the chief minister's office told sources.

He said the panel would identify suitable location for the project and check availability of infrastructure facilities like iron ore, water and rail and road linkages.

While the panel has three nominees of Arcelor-Mittal, the other five members are senior officials of the state government, including the chief secretary.

The other four state officials will be steel and mines secretary, chief managing director (CMD) of the Industrial Investment Promotion Corporation of Orissa Ltd (IPICOL), managing director of the Orissa Industrial Infrastructure Development Corp (IDCO) and special secretary of the commerce and transport department.

The official said IPICOL CMD had been appointed as secretary of the board, which is expected to meet soon.

Indian-born steel magnate Lakshmi N. Mittal, who visited Orissa July 7 and met Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, had proposed to set up a steel plant with an investment of about Rs.400 billion ($8.6 billion) over the next five to seven years.