more-inA Tamil parliamentarian on Thursday challenged a proposed housing project of steel maker ArcelorMittal in the Supreme Court, questioning both its suitability for the post-war region and the government’s tendering process. Sumanthiran petitioned the court seeking an interim order against the project, which has been highly contested for more than a year now. From the time the government roped in Indian-born billionaire Lakshmi Mittal’s company to build 65,000 houses in the Tamil-majority north and east, the project evoked sharp resistance. Engineering experts in Sri Lanka studied the proposed prefabricated housing model and said it was severely flawed in its design, compared to traditional brick-and-mortar homes that they recommended. Following opposition, the Sri Lankan government scaled down the project to build 6,000 prefabricated homes, which is likely to be executed by ArcelorMittal.

Source: The Hindu July 13, 2017 16:27 UTC