Orissa Khabar

The Chairman of Vedanta, “Anil Agarwal” is a big liar and along with some crooked politicians in the state and the centre, they are trying to loot Orissa. The state govt. is busy selling the whole of Orissa to such vultures. The second big vulture is POSCO! This country has no democracy. Corrupt politicians are just forcing there will on innocent and uneducated tribals by fooling or bribing them. If this is not stopped, there will soon be a day, when the whole of Orissa will be at the mercy of such vulture capitalists.

MUMBAI 8 Feb: (Courtesy: The Economic Times)

Vedanta Resources, the Anil Agarwal-controlled mining and metals conglomerate, continues to battle a maelstrom of allegations over its
proposed mining work in Niyamgiri, Orissa. The Church of England, a shareholder in the London-listed Vedanta, last week exited its investment alleging unclear rehabilitation policies.

The Church of England isn’t the whole institution to have expressed displeasure over alleged ethical lapses by Vedanta which has operations in India, Zambia, Armenia and Australia. In 2007, the Norwegian government’s pension fund sold its stake in Vedanta citing similar reasons as the Church of England.

A coalition of NGOs and activists, foreign and Indian, has for long carried on an unremitting campaign against plans by Sterlite, the Indian arm of Vedanta, to mine bauxite in Orissa. The mining activities have been approved by the Supreme Court in 2008, though the company is yet to receive final regulatory approval from the environment ministry.

As part of the approval process, the company is supposed to engage the local population. Reports by two UK-based NGOs, Survival International and Amnesty International, the latter a body that specialises in probing abuses of human rights, alleged that Vedanta wasn’t doing enough for the local tribal populace that faces displacement once mining at Niyamgiri commences. These reports contributed to the Church of England’s decision to sell its stake.

Vedanta chairman Anil Agarwal robustly denied allegations of maltreatment of locals. In an email response to a detailed questionnaire from ET, Mr Agarwal said that the mining project at Niyamgiri has been formally authorised by the Supreme Court, following a lengthy and extensively documented approval and procedure, implemented jointly by Vedanta’s subsidiary and its Orissa state government partner, Orissa Mining Corporation.

“The approval procedure included due consultation with local communities carried out strictly in accordance with India’s legal requirements, which revealed that the majority of the local community supported the project,” he told ET.

A senior Sterlite official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, saw the hands of what he described as “foreign mining giants” behind the activities of the NGOs. Shareholder meetings of Vedanta in London have routinely attracted demonstrations by activists and tribal people from Orissa who are allegedly facing displacement.

Despite the global spread of its operations, the bulk of Vedanta’s revenues and profits originate from India. Sterlite, its flagship Indian arm, is 52% owned by the promoters, the Agarwal family. Institutional shareholders include MFs like UTI, which own 3.5%, insurance companies (3.9%) and FIIs (14.5%)

On Sunday, large domestic institutions such as state-owned Life Insurance Corporation (LIC) and ICICI Prudential Life weren’t very forthcoming with their comments.

While LIC, which owns a little over 2% in Sterlite, didn’t respond to enquiries by ET, chairman TS Vijayan didn’t return phone calls or replied to text messages, ICICI Prudential Life managing director V Vaidyanathan said he wouldn’t like to comment on the subject.

It is however unclear whether these two institutions would be influenced by the Church of England’s decision, as typically, Indian lenders make their own assessment on such investments. ICICI Pru owns about 1.5% in Sterlite.

Sterlite owns controlling stakes in Balco, an aluminium-maker and Hindustan Zinc, two companies which were bought by Sterlite during the privatisation carried out by the NDA government early years of the noughties. The Sterlite scrip closed at Rs 749 on Saturday, marginally up despite the controversy breaking over the weekend.

Activists allege that bauxite mining at Niyamgiri would destroy the natural environment at the place, besides displacing the tribal community. Even the Supreme Court imprimatur hasn’t quelled opposition.

The quality of the court’s decision has been criticised by many observers because it had stopped Vedanta Resources from mining bauxite in 2007 citing the decision by the Norwegian government to sell its stake in the company. But while barring Vedanta, the SC allowed mining by Sterlite, though the latter happens to be the Indian affiliate of Vedanta, a logic which has been criticised by many legal experts.

The criticism by the mother church of the Anglican community isn’t the only public relations fiasco confronting Mr Agarwal. In September last year an accident at an under construction power plant of Balco in Chattisgarh led to the death of over 50 workers and first information reports or FIRs being registered by the Police against senior company officials. Some Chinese engineers were also detained sparking a mini-diplomatic spat between China and India.

In the interview with ET Mr Agarwal said he deeply regretted the loss of life. Sterlite which makes copper at Tuticorin in Tamil Nadu has also faced allegations of damaging the environment, charges which the company denies.

Mr Agarwal has also had run-ins with shareholders. Vedanta had earlier faced opposition from global hedge funds to a restructuring plan, that was eventually dropped.

In 2008, The Children’s Investment Fund, a UK-based hedge fund, threatened legal action against Vedanta, if it didn’t withdraw a plan that would have distributed the company’s holdings in various entities, with TCIF alleging that the plan was skewed against minority shareholders. And in the early years of this century a plan to delist Sterlite from the Indian bourses was scuppered after receiving dollops of negative publicity.