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No nod for Cyber City project, says VS

V.S. Achuthanandan says IT Department is in the dark about the project.

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Chief Minister V. S. Achuthanandan said here on Wednesday that he had kept off the foundation stone-laying ceremony of Cyber City in Kochi last week as the Information Technology Department was in the dark about the details of the project.

“My department had not received sufficient details about the project. Nor had it given sanction for the project. Hence, I decided not to attend the function.”

The Chief Minister told the media that he would examine whether there were irregularities in the purchase of land for the Rs.4,000-crore project. (Hindustan Machine Tools had sold 70 acres of land to the promoters of Cyber City. The Opposition had criticised that HMT did not have the right to sell the land allocated to the company by the government.)

Mr. Achuthanandan announced that the government would seek an investigation by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) into the alleged irregularities in the modernisation project of Kerala Minerals and Metals Limited which was initiated during the United Democratic Front rule. The cost of the project which was Rs.760 crore had shot up to Rs.1,115 crore and there were allegations of large-scale corruption.

The Cabinet had decided to cancel four contracts for the project, which would have caused considerable losses to the company, and seek a detailed probe. As the contracts involved foreign companies, the investigation was proposed to be entrusted to the CBI. It had decided to grant permission to the company to take up a modernisation programme costing Rs.60 crore.

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