JSW Steel Ltd on Wednesday confirmed it would return the land, privately acquired in West Bengal for its proposed integrated steel project at Salboni in West Medinipur. The company had acquired some 294 acres from landowners in the proposed project area.

In a statement, the company said: “Considering the hardship to the erstwhile private landowners from whom the company acquired the land, the company voluntarily offered to give back the equivalent land out of the total project land to original landowners free of cost as a gesture of goodwill through the State Government, West Bengal as per applicable laws”.

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday said the Jindal Group had communicated to Finance Minister Amit Mitra that it wished to hand over the land.

JSW, however, said the 10 million tonne per annum “project implementation was on hold” in view of emerging problems over iron ore and coal linkages.

The company said, “JSW Steel will continue to work with the State Government of West Bengal to find alternatives to establish raw material linkages so as to take up implementation of the steel project in due course”.

It mentioned that during the course of pre-implementation of the project activity, the ban/restriction on iron ore mining in the country, followed by the cancellation of coal blocks, including the coalmines earmarked for the project, had led to complete uncertainty.

The project required 4,300 acres. Following the uncertainty, the company had stopped acquisition of land. The ruling party in the State has been demanding the return of the land.​