India's landless bracing up for grand battle *Rajender Singh Negi, OneWorld South Asia
20 October 2008
To commemorate the first anniversary of Janadesh 2007, representatives of
Ekta Parishad met to take stock of the past year's achievements and prepare
strategies for future struggles. They decided to storm India's capital once
again with a bigger force if the government did not listen to their demand
of land reforms.
*Gwalior, Madhya Pradesh:* Ekta Parishad's charismatic leader, P.V.
Rajagopal announced on Sunday in Gwalior that if Indian government did not
fulfill its promise of land distribution, he would again storm the national
capital – this time with a force of 100,000 people rallying behind him.
He said: "We will march for people's liberation or *janmukti* in 2012, if
the government does not listen to our demands." He, however, clarified that
this did not mean no struggles would be carried in the interregnum.
"We would continue to fight at local levels against forced evictions and
displacements and continue to press the governments to redistribute those
lands, which are less disputable, such as the already available
*bhoodan*and village
*panchayat* lands."
The exhibition ground on posh Race Course Road in this historic city was
abuzz with people this weekend. Around 6,000 people had gathered in there,
coming from as many as 15 different states of India to commemorate the first
anniversary of People's Verdict 2007 or *Janadesh*.
State representatives and members of Ekta Parishad, a Gandhian organisation
claiming to have 2.5 lakh primary members, had assembled for a two-day
national-level dialogue on land issue.
Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan also addressed the
gathering. The dialogue ended with a huge rally on the second day at
Phoolbagh.
Intercepted by songs and slogans, proceedings started with leaders of
respective states giving accounts of the progress made so far and took stock
of the achievements and failures on the ground. The occasion was also used
to pay tribute to those 11 comrades who had lost their lives during last
year's march.
Even while recounting achievements in terms of more awareness among
villagers about entitlements and a new-found zeal to carry forward their
struggles, each of the speakers also spoke of no or little progress in
implementation of laws and policies on the ground.
Ransingh Parmar, national convener of Ekta Parishad said in his address that
it was unfortunate that people continued to be denied of their rights.
They lamented that the process of redistribution of land was not just
painfully slow but in many cases the government had even taken away whatever
little patch of land they had in the name of various developmental projects.
Shanti Behan, who had come from Jharkhand, wanted to know why was it that
despite so much investment of both public and private capital, more and more
people in her state were getting poorer by the day? "In the name of
development, this government is playing the dance of destruction,
" she
retorted.
Ram Swaroop hailing from the same state, mentioned how people in hundreds of
thousands of villages across the state were getting affected by several
ongoing and up-coming projects. These companies, which include both private
and public sector units, are vying with each other to acquire prime
agricultural land.
At Asanboni in East Singhbhum district, people are engaged in struggle
against Jindal Steel, which wants to set up 5 MT steel plant over 3,000
acres of land with an investment of Rs 20,000 crores.
In the same district, Bhushan Steel has been recently forced to suspend work
at its Potka project site due to stiff opposition from villagers over
anomalies in the sale of land.
Arcelor Mittal group, touted as the world's largest steel maker, has plans
to set up a US$ 8.2 billion plant in the mineral-rich state. The company is
demanding 11,000 acres for the 12 MT plant and an industrial town.
People are also opposing this proposed steel project, saying that they need
food, not steel. They are determined to give up their lives but "not an inch
of their farmlands."
*Tough struggle ahead*
K.B. Saxena, a former top bureaucrat and currently the member of National
Land Reform Committee, said that it was ironical that all policies of the
central government went against land reforms.
He pointed out that on one hand there was increase in the number of landless
in the country, and on the other the governments of the day are busy
acquiring land for the industrialists instead of carrying out genuine land
reforms.
He advised the people gathered to continue pressurising the government to
take steps in the right direction.
"Today the struggle for land rights has become much more complex, tough and
dangerous. Earlier the fight was against only the landlords but today
powerful capitalists are in the fray with governments often found to be
helping them," he warned.
*Janadesh 2007*
Last year 25,000 landless villagers, majority of whom were
*dalits*(Scheduled Castes) and
*adivasis* (Scheduled Tribes), from different parts of the country had
arrived in Delhi, covering a distance of 340 kilometers over a month-long
torturous journey, to demand land for the landless.
In this long march, they had lost 11 of their comrades on the way – three
dying on the spot when a speeding truck had run over them and eight others
succumbing to ailments like cholera, diahorrea and fatigue.
The rally had culminated in old Delhi area's Ramlila ground. The government
at the centre eventually paying heed to the demands of rallyists, announced
setting up of a National Land Reform Council to be headed by Prime Minister
Manmohan Singh.
The central government also announced a committee on the State Agrarian
Relations and Unfinished Land Reforms, which was to be headed Rural
Development Minister Raghuvansh Prasad Singh, to look into all land-related
issues including land reforms; make recommendations on a detailed land
reform policy; distribute land to all eligible persons; and ensure speedy
disposal of land-dispute cases. These recommendations were to be submitted
to the council headed by Prime Minister.
A draft national policy on land reforms is ready and soon will be presented
to Prime Minister, informs Ramesh Sharma, one of the members of the
committee.
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