Consider the following statements 1. The USSR assisted in the building of the Bhilai Steel Plant. 2. The British assisted in the building of the Bokaro Steel Plant. Which of the statements given above is/are correct?

The Bhilai Steel Plant was established in 1959 in the Durg district of Chhattisgarh with the technical cooperation and assistance of the Soviet Union (USSR) [c1, t4]. This collaboration was a cornerstone of Indo-Soviet economic ties during the Second Five-Year Plan [c3, t6]. In contrast, the Bokaro Steel Plant, commissioned in 1964, was also built with Soviet collaboration, not British assistance [c2, t2]. The British (UK) actually assisted in the establishment of the Durgapur Steel Plant in West Bengal [t1, t5]. Therefore, statement 1 is correct as the USSR assisted Bhilai, but statement 2 is incorrect because Bokaro was a Soviet-aided project rather than a British one. The Soviet Union provided extensive training and technical expertise for both the Bhilai and Bokaro projects to bolster India's heavy industry [c4, t3].

Sources

1. [1] Geography of India ,Majid Husain, (McGrawHill 9th ed.) > Chapter 11: Industries > 4. Bhilai Iron and Steel Plant (HSL) > p. 33
2. [2] Geography of India ,Majid Husain, (McGrawHill 9th ed.) > Chapter 11: Industries > 7. Bokaro, Bharat Steel Limited (BSL) > p. 34
3. [3] Geography of India ,Majid Husain, (McGrawHill 9th ed.) > Chapter 11: Industries > IRON AND STEEL INDUSTRY > p. 28
4. [4] Contemporary World Politics, Textbook in political science for Class XII (NCERT 2025 ed.) > Chapter 1: The End of Bipolarity > FLASHBACK: INDIA AND THE USSR > p. 12
5. [5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bokaro_Steel_Plant
6. [6] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhilai_Steel_Plant