Prime Minister Narendra Modi lays foundation stone for Gorakhpur urea plant revival

GORAKHPUR: Prime Minister Narendra Modi today laid the foundation stone for the revival of a sick fertiliser plant here with an investment of Rs 6,000 crore, a move which will create up to 4,000 jobs and ensure adequate supply of nutrients to farmers in Uttar Pradesh.

The gas-based urea plant of the state-run Fertiliser Corporation India Ltd (FCIL) will be revived by an equal joint venture company between Coal India Ltd (CIL) and NTPC Ltd.

Addressing a rally after laying the foundation stone, Modi said the revival of the fertiliser plant is going to bring a big change as gas-based economy will start with supply of gas in Gorakhpur through Jagdishpur-Haldia pipeline.

"It is not merely inauguration of a factory but the start of a victory march that will defeat poverty, unemployment...," he said.

In a dig at previous Congress governments at the Centre, Modi said they used to import urea and other fertilisers while plants remained closed in India.

His government, he said, has decided to revive closed plants and noted that most of them, like in Sindri and Barauni, were in eastern part of the country, which needed to be strengthened if India was to develop.

"The revival of the plant entailing an investment of Rs 6,000 crore is in the equity pattern of 50 per cent each between both the CPSE entities each," an official statement said.

In a brief presentation, the Prime Minister was informed that the revival of the plant is expected to offer 3,000-4,000 jobs to skilled workforce in the state.

Fertiliser Minister Ananth Kumar, MSME Minister Kalraj Mishra, Health Minister J P Nadda, Power and Mines Minister Piyush Goyal and Minister of State for Health Anupriya Patel were present at the event.

Uttar Pradesh Governor Ram Naik, Gorakhpur MP Yogi Adityanath and senior officials of NTPC and Coal India were also present at the event.

The central government said gas would be made available to the Gorakhpur fertiliser plant through the proposed Jagdishpur-Haldia pipeline to be constructed by GAIL.

"The revitalisation of these plants would help generate 1.27 million tonne per annum of urea along with other associated chemicals from each plant, bridging the demand supply gap of urea," it said.

Earlier on May 16, NTPC and CIL had formally inked a pact to set up a joint venture firm 'Hindustan Urvarak Rasayan Ltd' that would look into the revival of the fertiliser plant.

The country's urea output this year is estimated to rise to 25 million tonnes in 2016-17 fiscal, still lower than the annual demand of 32 million tonnes. The balance is met through imports.