By IANS
Bhubaneswar : Anti-Posco activists in Orissa, who had detained seven employees of a dredging firm at Dhinkia village in Jagatsinghpur district, released then Friday morning, the police said.
The abducted people work for Dharitri Dreging Co, which is working in the region on behalf of Indian Oil Corp (IOC), A. Mishra, officer-in-charge of the local Kujanga police station told IANS.
When Dharitri employees were doing some survey work near Jatadhari River Thursday afternoon, hundreds of anti-Posco activists rushed to the spot and detained them at Dhinkia village, he said.
“The anti-Posco activists released them Friday after confining them for over 12 hours,” he said.
The released officials have not yet lodged any written complaint against the activists, he added.
“Some officials are coming to the proposed Posco site under the name of other companies. That is why we had detained these people because we suspected them to be Posco officials,” president of Posco Pratirodh Sangram Samiti (PPSS) Abhaya Sahu told IANS.
“We released them after confirming they do not belong to Posco,” he added.
South Korean steel major Pohang Iron and Steel Co (Posco) proposes to build a $12-billion steel plant near Paradeep port in Orissa. It is the largest single foreign direct investment in India.
Over 20,000 people from around 15 nearby villages have been protesting the project, saying it would take away their homes and livelihoods.
They are not allowing any company or government officials to enter the proposed site since the day the company signed a deal with the state government for the plant in June 2005.
The protestors have detained several government and company officials in the past and released them after obtaining signed undertakings from them that they will not visit the region again.
Posco-India and the Orissa government say the plant will bring economic prosperity to the state and create jobs, although it will affect 500 families in the area.