Narendra Modi's war on the environment
by Rohini Mohan
<http://america.aljazeera.com/profiles/m/rohini-mohan.html>
@rohini_mohan <http://www.twitter.com/rohini_mohan> April 10, 2015
5:00AM ET
Since coming to power last year, the Indian leader has diluted
ecological protections in the name of development
http://america.aljazeera.com/multimedia/2015/4/narendra-modis-war-on-the-indian-environment.html
Balkumar Rathiya and his family, residents of Sarasmal village in the
central Indian state of Chhattisgarh, stand at the edge of their
property, which abuts a giant Jindal Steel open-cast coal mine. The
corporation has taken over the family's land.Sami Siva for Al Jazeera
America
TAMNAR, India -- Tarika Lakra's days have a predictable quality. The
32-year-old is a nurse in the Tamnar village government hospital in
Raigarh district in the central Indian state of Chhattisgarh, where she
works eight hours per day in the women's ward. Afterward, she does an
hour of housekeeping and cooking in the staff quarters that she shares
with her husband, a shop owner. Then, all evening and during her days
off, she meets with lawyers and the police, goes to court and spends
long hours reading legal documents and scouring the Internet, trying to
keep up with the rapid undoing of everything she holds dear. "That's the
role taking over my life," says Lakra. "I'm fighting a giant every day."
Until eight years ago, Lakra's evenings looked very different. They were
spent at her orchard -- 27.5 acres of fertile land packed with about 300
mango trees, 400 cashew, 315 sagwan teak and 400 of the local mahua. Her
father had spent his life's savings on this piece of land, Lakra says,
irrigating it and putting in two tube wells. He taught his daughter how
to graft stems, choose fertilizer and tend to a tree so that it would
produce the best fruit. After he died, Lakra took over. "He dreamt that
this land should be a patch of man-made paradise resembling the forest
nearby, that it should employ many villagers and be a proud gift to pass
on to his grandchildren," she says. "But a family like mine can't have
dreams in Raigarh."
Raigarh is part of Chhattisgarh's massive industrial belt and has long
attracted steel, cement and thermal-power companies to its rich seams of
coal. Tamnar village is where it all began, with the government granting
Jindal Steel & Power Ltd, or JSPL, a coal-mining permit in 1996, making
it the first private company to generate power in India. It started with
a capacity of 1,000 megawatts, now expanded to 2,400. Today, Raigarh is
often called Jindal Kingdom. JSPL has an enormous campus with thermal
power and steel plants. In addition to its coal mines, it runs a private
college and numerous schools, which sprawl through half the district.
Gradually, other private companies, such as Adani Mining, Monnet Ispat
and Hindalco Industries, also flocked here.
After months of tussle, India suspends Greenpeace
Just yesterday, the Indian government, led by Prime Minister Narendra
Modi, fired its latest salvo in its war against environmental activists:
It suspended Greenpeace India for six months and froze the group's bank
accounts. "When they don't like the message, they shoot the messenger,"
says Greenpeace's program director Divya Raghunandan.
<http://america.aljazeera.com/multimedia/2015/4/india-greenpeace-suspension.html>
Tarika Lakra, who says JSPL appropriated her orchard against her
will.Sami Siva for Al Jazeera America
Lakra's fertile orchard now belongs to JSPL. But her land was purloined,
not purchased, she says. In May 2003, Lakra went out to her orchard to
check on the harvest, only to find a mountain of debris dumped on the
land. "I thought it was a mistake," she says. Though Lakra had received
a company notice asking for her land, she had not yet made a decision to
sell. But when she went to her farm, a group of thugs stopped her at her
gate, claiming that the property belonged to JSPL.
She filed a complaint accusing the company of grabbing her land, but the
police and state government officials ignored her, Lakra says. JSPL paid
her about 1.5 million rupees ($24,000) as compensation, which she
estimates to be a fourth of the market value for a plot as fertile as
hers. JSPL's lawyers in Chhattisgarh High Court-Bilaspur countered that
the orchard had only one nilgiri tree, one tamarind tree and a thatched
house. "They said it was barren land and they'd paid its worth," scoffs
Lakra. The court ordered the company to stop building on her land until
the case was settled, but the thugs stayed, and soon the O.P. Jindal
engineering college and a private road were built where her trees once
grew.
Lakra has now joined forces with two others, among hundreds, with
similar experiences. Krishnalal Sao is a 51-year-old constable in the
home guards, an auxiliary service to the state police. He lost two acres
after someone dumped rubble on his harvest of rice. When a neighbor told
him about it, Sao ran there to stop them, but goons intercepted him. A
notice on his gate declared the land to be the property of JSPL. When he
tried to file a report at the police station, a senior policeman
suggested he give in. An angry Sao handed in his resignation and went to
court alleging intimidation and land grabbing. He now runs a
photocopying store in Tamnar while he awaits a court hearing.
Raghunath Chaudhry, one of Tarika Lakra's partners in the complaint
against JSPL, in his shop in Tamnar. Sami Siva for Al Jazeera America
Lakra's other partner is 67-year-old Raghunath Chaudhry, who owns a
run-down store selling bits and bobs outside the enormous steel gate of
the JSPL premises. He says that in 2004, his then-16-year-old son was
beaten up regularly on his way to school because the family refused to
sell their five-acre plot to the company. "Finally [on July 7, 2005],
some men dragged him inside the Jindal campus and poisoned him," says
Chaudhry. The teenager staggered home, told his mother he felt woozy,
lay down to sleep and never woke up. "We were so distressed, we cremated
our son the next morning," says Chaudhry. It was only a few days later,
when his farmland was snatched, that Chaudhry wondered if the two events
were connected. Afraid for the rest of his family, he didn't file a
police report of land grabbing or allege murder for months. "But seeing
Tarika and Krishnalal, I also decided to fight this," he says.
Despite numerous requests for comment from JSPL's public-relations
officer and the company's general manager in Tamnar, neither replied.
The tehsildar, or revenue administrator, and superintendent of police in
Raigarh also declined to respond.
JSPL now owns Lakra's, Sao's and Chaudhry's assets. "Two or three
batches [of students] have graduated from the college on my orchard,"
says Lakra. From his little shop, Chaudhry points to the smoking towers
of the power plant behind him, visible against the horizon from anywhere
in the village. A part of it stands on his land. "Seeing it is a
reminder of how I don't matter," he says. "We keep fighting for the
truth while the lie is establishing itself into a concrete reality
throughout our town."
A power plant in Korba, Chhattisgarh. Sami Siva for Al Jazeera America
The land appropriation in Raigarh may sound extreme, but it is only one
example among many of how private companies and the government are able
to violate laws with impunity. And the situation is set to deteriorate.
As the trio fight their cases, hoping to get justice in court, the
Indian government is diluting the very protections people like them are
counting on.
The Bharatiya Janata Party, or BJP, government came to power last May in
a massive wave of support for Narendra Modi, now the prime minister, and
his agenda of economic development for all. In under a year, it has
begun to undo policies of fair land acquisition, undermine environmental
protection and reverse the fight for tribal rights. The finance,
environment and rural-development ministers, and Modi himself, have
called these safeguards to protect people's property, the environment
and tribal rights "roadblocks" to economic growth.
<http://indianexpress.com/article/india/india-others/green-ministry-is-no-more-a-roadblock-prakash-javadekar/>
Rules that ensure business responsibility to people and the environment,
in other words, are now largely being written off.
Young men play cricket near the Kusmunda open-cast coal field. Sami Siva
for Al Jazeera America
For decades in India, regressive policies favored industrial growth over
people's rights. Affected villages would routinely erupt in massive and
often violent protests against land grabs, pollution and forced
evictions. Thousands of cases like Lakra's still languish in courts
across the country. On the other hand, corporate officials complained of
wasted investments, bureaucratic logjams and market uncertainty.
In the last decade, the government, led by the Congress party, tried to
address some of these complaints. It strengthened the rights of tribal
communities over forestlands and set up the National Green Tribunal, a
special court with environmental expertise to hear grievances about
green violations within short deadlines. It replaced a 120-year-old
draconian law that allowed land to be acquired for inconsistent payment
and without permission from owners, with the progressive Land
Acquisition Act in 2013. This provided higher rates and made consent
from a large majority of landowners necessary before acquiring land for
industry. It also ensured that companies assess the impact of their
proposed projects on the whole community, including on non-owners such
as landless farm workers, fishermen who use local rivers or even
children who might lose their school or playground. The Ministry of
Environment, Forest and Climate Change also mapped out forest areas that
must never be diverted for industry or infrastructure.
The changes had limitations due to political compromises and corporate
pressure, activists say, but were still a long-awaited win for
communities that had demanded sustainable growth. Since 2014, however,
these progressive steps have begun to be reversed. As parliamentary
elections approached, the Congress party started to weaken some of its
own policies. The party's ratings had sunk due to million-dollar scams
that exposed its coalition members' corruption in coal mining
<http://www.livemint.com/Politics/zyBgCh7SmkYlV6Wpz9XANO/Manmohan-Singh-made-accused-in-coal-scam-case.html>
and telecom spectrum licensing
<http://www.ndtv.com/india-news/what-is-2g-spectrum-scam-439271>.
Desperate for an image makeover, the party rolled back some
environmental protections that Indian businesses said had stalled growth.
"In damage-control mode, the Congress scaled back the pro-people laws.
This was also to woo corporates for campaign funding," says activist
Medha Patkar, pointing to the tens of millions of rupees funneled by
corporations into the campaign coffers of both national parties (90
percent of all campaign funding in 2013-14
<http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2014-12-24/news/57376592_1_crore-adr-report-bharat-forge-ltd>).
Some of this, by foreign companies such as Vedanta, violated campaign
laws
<http://in.reuters.com/article/2014/03/28/india-election-donations-vedanta-idINDEEA2R0DZ20140328>.
The Congress party subsequently increased exemptions from the
environmental laws for certain companies and allotted many forests to
industry.
Surajbai, 80, poses at the site of her old home in Barkutta, which was
destroyed. The land is now under the proposed area of expansion by the
Kusmunda coal mining operation. Sami Siva for Al Jazeera America
The Modi government has loosened these laws even further. Now, in more
instances, land can be taken without asking owners. Consent from
villagers is mostly unnecessary. Tribal rights hang by a thread. Forests
are fair game, and pollution monitoring is more lenient than ever.
The government claims these moves will boost economic growth. During his
2015 budget speech, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said projects worth
millions were "held up for want of permissions" under the previous
governments
<http://www.business-standard.com/article/news-ians/upa-government-practiced-crony-capitalism-jaitley-115013000457_1.html>.
This may be true for government-owned projects, but nearly 95 percent of
projects proposed by private companies have received environmental
clearances, and only 13 percent of stalled infrastructure projects have
been held up <http://indiabudget.nic.in/es2014-15/echapvol1-04.pdf> by
land-acquisition procedures. "Unfavorable market conditions (and not
regulatory clearances) are stalling a large number of projects in the
private sector <http://indiabudget.nic.in/es2014-15/echapvol1-04.pdf>,"
according to the Economic Survey of India. "Perhaps contrary to popular
belief, the evidence points towards over exuberance and a credit bubble
as primary reasons."
Even without much evidence, the growth rhetoric has remained a powerful
justification for the government. BJP ministers equate fast growth with
national pride
<http://www.frontline.in/cover-story/targeting-ngos/article6141097.ece>
and have called demands for human rights and conservation "anti-national
<http://www.caravanmagazine.in/perspectives/international-interest>"
<http://www.caravanmagazine.in/perspectives/international-interest>
activity. Patkar says the previous governments were "at least open to
conversation with NGOs and people's groups. That door is fast shut
today. They are making policies more aggressive, no matter what the cost."
In August 2014, Modi's cabinet set up a committee to review six key
environmental and climate change laws
<http://indianexpress.com/article/india/india-others/the-six-minds-that-will-look-afresh-at-environment-laws>.
"Their mandate was enormous and vague. It held only six to seven public
consultations, and only one of five members was associated with the
environment in any way," says a critic of the process, environmental
lawyer Shibani Ghosh, from the Delhi-based Centre for Policy Research.
In only three months, the body was to recommend changes to laws on
everything from water pollution and forest conservation, to coastal zone
regulations and recycling electronic discards. "Once the recommendations
were out, it was clear the committee was simply meant to remove human
rights and green roadblocks for investment growth," says Ghosh.
The committee suggested a single-window clearance for all green permits,
something corporations in India have long lobbied for. In project
applications, companies should assess the potential environmental damage
their own projects could cause, instead of asking affected communities
or the regional pollution-control board to do so, as the earlier rules
required. The committee also recommended eliminating all government and
independent monitoring and letting companies disclose their own
violations, with no oversight. These new rules, the committee says, will
oblige companies to act in "utmost good faith."
Community leaders from the village of Khodri listen to an activist
during a meeting to discuss a plan of action for an upcoming public
hearing. Sami Siva for Al Jazeera America
Ramesh Agrawal, a prominent environmental activist, at his home in
Raigarh. He has trouble walking after gunmen broke into his home in 2012
and shot him.Sami Siva for Al Jazeera America
Critics say the recommendations "undermine democracy"
<http://counterview.org/2015/01/17/tsr-subramanian-committee-report-undermines-democracy-renders-projected-affected-people-voiceless-is-blind-to-climate-change>
and "render the affected voiceless." As Raigarh's long history of
industrialization shows, good faith is scarce in resource-rich regions.
The district magistrate of Raigarh, Mukesh Bansal, who is the main
administrative officer for the district, admits that "the land mafia"
has a strong hold and that companies often use its goons to take over
land or forests. Over the past two years, Bansal has spearheaded a
project to return more than 800 acres of tribal land that had been
grabbed under 200 fake names. "When coal deposits are discovered, the
middlemen move in, hold land and, when companies take over, there's
profits all around except for the tribal" people, he says.
Ramesh Agrawal, a prominent environmental activist in Raigarh, is also
critical of the new recommendations. "Where in the world have companies
admitted to polluting rivers?" he asks. "When companies have to police
themselves, they don't."
A tall, soft-spoken man, Agrawal has reason to mistrust corporations.
After he and other activists accused JSPL of not following norms
<http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/environmental-activist-shot-and-wounded-in-chhattisgarh/article3613848.ece>
while holding a public hearing in 2010 for a coal mine expansion, and
beginning construction before getting the appropriate environmental
clearances, he was arrested because the company filed a complaint of
defamation, criminal intimidation and incitement. The recording of the
hearing shows that Agrawal was listing violations by the company since
the '90s, and at one point, he lost his composure
<http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Arrest-of-an-activist-raises-uncomfortable-questions/articleshow/8721825.cms>
and said in Hindi, "If they [Jindal officials] are sons of their
fathers, they should come forward."
Agrawal is indignant. "I wasn't polite, yes, but is that a reason for
arrest? And what about their violations?" he asks. He was in jail for 60
days, until the Supreme Court released him on bail. The activist took
the case to the National Green Tribunal in Delhi. After reviewing video
evidence, the tribunal called JSPL's public hearing "a mockery" and "a
classic example of violation of the rules and the principles of natural
justice." It went on to cancel the environmental clearance for JSPL's
coal mine
<http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/tp-newdelhi/green-tribunal-says-no-to-jindal-steel/article3341105.ece>.
A month later, in 2012, gunmen broke into Agrawal's home in Raigarh and
shot him <http://www.caravanmagazine.in/vantage/man-who-dared>,
shattering his thigh bone. In his police complaint, Agrawal said the
attackers told him to "stop taking on Jindal," but the company has
denied any involvement
<http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/environmental-activist-shot-and-wounded-in-chhattisgarh/article3613848.ece>.
Now Agrawal has difficulty walking. "If existing procedures are not
working, the government should fix them, not get rid of them," he says.
"Then there will be no place to appeal to when the faith is violated."
The South Eastern Coalfields Limited coal pit in Raigarh. Sami Siva for
Al Jazeera America
About three-quarters of India's electricity needs are met by coal-fired
thermal power <http://www.downtoearth.org.in/content/coal-toll>. Power
Minister Piyush Goyal said in a parliamentary debate last December, "The
country is hugely short on coal supply
<http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Lok-Sabha-passes-coal-mines-bill/articleshow/45500939.cms>
and has to spend tens of millions of rupees on coal imports despite
having the third largest coal reserves in the world." India has about 10
percent of the world's coal reserves, but is also the world's third
biggest coal importer <http://www.mcl.gov.in/Others/ecoalfields.php>.
The industry was mired in a massive corruption scam in 2012
<http://www.business-standard.com/article/companies/7-things-you-wanted-to-know-about-coalgate-113101500366_1.html>,
which exposed the Congress government's corrupt allocation of coal
mines. The Supreme Court called the allotment arbitrary and illegal and
canceled 214 fields with coal deposits allocated to private parties from
1993 to 2008. While this was a course correction, it also exacerbated
the fuel shortage.
The new government's main agenda is to increase coal production, raise
more revenue for the state and change the licensing procedure from
allocation to auctions of coal blocks. To accomplish these goals, the
BJP has passed two laws related to mining and coal.
For four decades, mining in India was dominated by the state-owned Coal
India Ltd., which is the world's largest miner of coal and the only
outfit in India allowed to sell or export coal commercially to other
companies. Private power, steel and cement companies can mine coal only
for their own consumption. The new coal law -- Coal Mines (Special
Provisions) Act 2015 -- effectively ends government monopoly over
extraction of coal, allowing private firms to mine and sell coal
commercially and making way for foreign companies to do so in the future.
The mining law -- Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation)
Amendment Act 2015 -- puts in place a system of competitive bidding,
instead of government allocations. Since February, the coal-and-power
ministry has auctioned 33 coal blocks to private companies, which have
given the coal-rich states revenue of more than 2 trillion rupees
<http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2015-03-25/news/60475215_1_coal-blocks-lakh-crore-coal-auction>
(about
$32 billion) by way of royalties over a 30-year period. With 90 million
tons of coal expected to be produced from just the 42 operational mines
in the blocks auctioned so far, Coal Secretary Anil Swarup says the
chronic coal shortage and reliance on large imports could end
<http://in.reuters.com/article/2014/11/20/india-coal-secretary-anil-swarup-idINKCN0J40XO20141120>
in almost four years.
The Hasdo river in Korba, a hub for coal and thermal power production.
Sami Siva for Al Jazeera America
A coal washery in Korba. Sami Siva for Al Jazeera America
While the auctions raise revenue for states and streamline allotments,
many say the new mining policy is still shortsighted.
Coal energy is cheap, but dirty. A study by the Delhi-based Centre for
Science and Environment, or CSE, found that Indian coal-fired power
plants were some of the most inefficient and polluting
<http://www.downtoearth.org.in/content/coal-toll> in the world. More
than 75 percent of them don't comply with regulations
<http://cseindia.org/content/india%E2%80%99s-first-ever-environmental-rating-coal-based-power-plants-finds-sector%E2%80%99s-performance>,
the study finds, a problem that is exacerbated because the power deficit
in India "gives the industry enormous amount of leverage."
And measures are being taken to further reduce environmental regulation.
Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar often refers to environmental
clearances as impediments to India's electricity needs. In its first
month in power, his ministry issued a series of memos allowing coal
mines to expand
<http://www.amnesty.org.in/show/news/changes-to-environment-land-acquisition-laws-jeopardize-human-rights/>
up to several times their current size without any public hearings or
environmental clearances.
Some of the effects of these legal rewrites are visible in the Raigarh
coalfields called Gare Palma IV, the same ones in which Agrawal and
others objected to the presence of mining. The contested mines have been
reauctioned to a different company. "It is as if all the previous times
we said no never happened," says Agrawal. "This time, with all the
changed policies, and lesser accountability, it will be even easier for
them."
He is watching with trepidation because, he says, the Modi government
"seems to be regularizing a rotten system." The World Bank
conservatively estimates that the cost of environmental degradation in
India is 5.7 percent of GDP every year, higher than the rate of growth
of national income
<http://www.worldbank.org/en/news/press-release/2013/07/17/india-green-growth-necessary-and-affordable-for-india-says-new-world-bank-report>.
Attendees protest at the public hearing organized by South Eastern
Coalfields Limited to expand its operation at the Kusmunda open-cast
mines. Sami Siva for Al Jazeera America
Kamlabai Kanwar, chief of Pali villageSami Siva for Al Jazeera America
A few hours' drive away from the city of Raigarh lies Chhattisgarh's
Korba district, the single biggest source of power-grade coal in the
country. In early February, a public hearing was held to assess the
environmental impact of the potential expansion of the government-run
Kusmunda open-cast coal mine. The mine's owner, South Eastern Coalfields
Limited, or SECL, wanted to excavate 62.5 million tons per year, nearly
three and a half times the 18.42 million tons it currently has
permission for. If it gets clearance, Kusmunda will become the biggest
coal mine in Asia.
In the '70s, the Kusmunda mine was opened at 5 million tons a year, and
it has been growing ever since. Its last public hearing was in 2008,
when it gained clearance to expand from mining 10 million tons a year to
15 million tons a year. In 2014, using the new rules, it was able to
mine 18.42 million tons without a public consultation. "We didn't even
know it happened," says the chief of nearby Pali village, Kamlabai
Kanwar. "That's exactly what the new law allows: silent expansion, with
no chance for an affected person to say a thing." SECL conducted a
public hearing in February only because it now proposes expanding to a
whopping 43.75 million tons a year.
At the stadium where the hearing was being held, hundreds of farmers,
tribal people and laborers arrived with black headbands, demanding that
mining activity not be increased. "SECL down, down!" and "We don't want
the mine!" they shouted.
"We don't want to wheeze and die like our crops are already doing," said
Vinod Kumar Yadav from Pali village at the microphone set up near the
stage. About 20 villages have already been razed by Kusmunda, and the
expansion, if approved, would swallow five more. In 2009, Korba ranked
fifth in the Central Pollution Control Board's list of critically
polluted places in India
<http://cpcb.nic.in/upload/AnnualReports/AnnualReport_37_ANNUAL_REPORT-08-09.pdf>,
and the Congress government banned further industrialization there.
However, it also flip-flopped, lifting and reimposing the ban a few
times for some power plants, with monitoring only by local pollution
officers. "Mines and power companies swooped back in, and pollution has
reached alarming levels," says Korba-based mining activist Laxmi
Chauhan. Kusmunda's environmental assessment report, however, admitted
to only potential air and water pollution, without taking into account
existing levels of pollution.
"See from our plight and learn," said an enraged Devkumar Rathiya at the
hearing. Rathiya, who lives in Pali village, had already lost his land
in the previous expansion. "Tribals, remember your forestland rights.
Don't be manipulated."
Members of the public express their opposition to the proposed expansion
of the Kusmunda coal mine at the public hearing. Sami Siva for Al
Jazeera America
The general manager of mining from South Eastern Coalfields Limited,
Ranjan Prasad Sah, speaks at the public hearing in Korba. Sami Siva for
Al Jazeera America
Almost all of the coal-producing areas in central India are forested.
They are alsohome
<http://www.greenpeace.org/india/Global/india/report/How-Coal-mining-is-Trashing-Tigerland.pdf>to
10 tiger reserves
<http://www.greenpeace.org/india/Global/india/report/How-Coal-mining-is-Trashing-Tigerland.pdf>,
a variety of wildlife and nearly 9,000 villages. Across the country,
roughly 40 percent of the people displaced by dams, power plants and
mines are tribals
<http://www.ruralindiaonline.org/resources/report-of-the-high-level-committee-on-socio-economic-health-and-educational-status-of-the-tribals-of-india>,
even though they make up only about 9 percent of the country's
population. Recognizing tribal communities as stakeholders in
forestlands, the Forest Rights Act 2006 allows for the clearing of these
lands for development only after an applicant has gained the consent of
the local tribal-village council.
Last month, however, the Ministry of Environment suggested changes that
will allow the cutting of forests without tribal consent
<http://www.business-standard.com/article/economy-policy/govt-s-bid-to-dilute-tribal-rights-to-help-industry-115030300002_1.html>.
"If this happens, forestland in tribal areas will be easier to get and
cheaper for a company than any other type of land," says campaigner
Nandikesh Sivalingam from Greenpeace India, which the Modi government
calls "anti-national" for protesting corporate violations in forest
areas. After issuing several threats to the nonprofit to curb its
environmental activism, on April 10, the Ministry of Home Affairs
suspended the organization's registration
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2015/04/09/why-india-is-at-war-with-greenpeace>
under
the law that governs international funding.
Divya Raghunandan, the group's program director, says, "This is an
attempt to remove any kind of dissent despite the Supreme Court having
repeatedly said that differing opinions is not grounds for proving
anti-nationalism."
"In one blow, they've attacked conservation and human rights," adds
Aruna Sekhar, senior researcher with Amnesty International. In early
March, the tribal affairs minister, Jual Oram, whose initial objections
were ignored
<http://www.forestrightsact.com/corporate-projects/item/22-timeline-of-attempts-to-sabotage-forest-rights-for-large-projects/>,
wrote a seven-page letter to the Environment Ministry strongly objecting
to the dilution
<http://indianexpress.com/article/india/india-others/tribal-ministry-objects-to-diluting-forest-law/>.
Oram belongs to the Kurukh tribe and hails from the heavily forested and
mined state of Jharkhand, in eastern India. He writes that "there is no
evidence to show that Forest Rights Act is resulting in delays in forest
clearance" and that it would be illegal to erase tribal rights to forests.
Chhattisgarh-based activist Sudiep Shrivastava says the government's
push for mining, with simultaneous weakening of forest conservation and
tribal rights, is dangerous. "The Supreme Court's cancellation of coal
blocks was an opportunity to re-plan a sustainable process," says
Shrivastava. Before the court canceled the blocks, only 32 of the 800
allotted mines were even operational. "So why not get those to work
instead of giving more away?" he asks. "Do we need to mine all the
precious reserves right away?"
A train filled with coal prepares to leave Korba.
On the bumpy road from Raigarh town to the coal-bearing areas, a painted
sign says "Forest for Need, Not for Greed." The route is chockablock
with hundreds of coal-laden trucks. As they rumble by, plumes of black
dust rise and settle on suffocated, scrawny trees on either side,
planted by the mining companies for reforestation.
Beyond the sign, the temperature dips perceptibly, and the forest cover
is thicker. This is the edge of the Hasdeo-Arand forest, rich in
biodiversity and rare medicinal plants. In a satellite image, the area
of nearly 600 square miles is a large swath of dark green, but the
Geological Survey of India marks it coal black. It is one of the most
sought-after blocks in the country.
Earlier this year, 20 villages within this forest resolved to oppose any
coal mining here
<http://www.ndtv.com/india-news/as-india-faces-energy-shortage-tribal-protests-pose-threat-to-fresh-coal-allocations-in-chhattisgarh-734917>.
Alok Shukla, an activist from the Chhattisgarh Bachao Andolan (Save
Chhattisgarh Movement), explains that government committees in the past
declared this forest inviolate, but it keeps reappearing in the
coalfield list. "Forests have only five of the 300 billion tons of coal
reserves in the country. Can they not leave this area alone for some
decades till they have exhausted all other coal blocks?" asks Shukla.
A few miles outside the forest, Sarasmal village stands at the boundary
of the JSPL coal mines. Balkumar Rathiya, whose family home skirts the
edge of the mine, points to the fist-sized chunks of coal that fly into
his house during explosions. He worked as a mine blaster for three years
but was fired when he refused to sell his land for an expansion of the
mine. "Earlier, we thought that mines will mean more jobs for us, but we
can see now that jobs come rarely and at a price," he says. His wife and
mother grow some turnips and cabbage outside their house, and they get
free rice under the state food-security scheme. "I went from being a
farmer to a mine worker, and now from a mine worker to a charity case,"
he says. "I am asked to sacrifice my land for the country's growth, but
I still don't have power, there is no hospital, my health is shot
because of the mines, and I can't access the forest anymore."
Raigarh district, and therefore Sarasmal village, is protected under the
Indian constitution as a scheduled tribal area, and according to the
Panchayat (Extension to Scheduled Areas) Act, 1996, or PESA, all
companies must consult with tribal communities here before commencing
any industrial or infrastructural project. The 2006 Forest Rights Act
also applies; for a project to get clearance to tear down a forest, the
local village council must give written consent.
The state has filed 13 cases against Shivpal Bhagat, above. He says the
cases are retaliation for his efforts to organize the members of his
village to fight the Jindal power company. Sami Siva for Al Jazeera America
On several occasions, Sarasmal has refused to consent to the JSPL mine,
but many villagers allege that the project used forged documents to get
clearances. Shivpal Bhagat is one of those who has challenged this
alleged fraud in court. Today, he says he has 13 false cases filed
against him from the state authorities and the company. "If they can't
get consent, they falsify it," says Bhagat. "And if they can't do that,
they resort to thugs or false police cases." He faces charges of
obstructing government work, attacking company employees and leading a
protest march in the village. All these charges, he says, are based on
his speaking up at a public hearing. "A lot of my time and money is now
spent on going to the Bilaspur high court," Bhagat says. "But the mining
continues."
Frustrated, Bhagat contested and won the village-council election,
hoping to have more control as the village chief. "The Modi government
wants simpler procedures for development," says Bhagat. "I want to tell
them, It will all be simple if you treat a villager like a human being
and not simply an obstacle to your 24-hour power dreams." The Raigarh
subinspector of police Anand Chhabra denied they were trumped up cases.
As Bhagat speaks, however, villagers gather round and describe being
constantly intimidated by companies. Agents come with wads of cash to
impoverished homes, promising special jobs in the mines and painting
pictures of rehabilitation. But Bhagat says that repeated betrayal by
the companies and a loss of faith has led his village to agree on a
blanket denial for all mines.
Lawyer Sudha Bharadwaj, who works pro bono for dozens of villagers like
Bhagat, says, "People protest widely, but clearances are continuously
given." The cases against the villagers are weak, but the overburdened
court system means that litigation can drag on for years. Her clients,
many of them poor or living in remote areas, are summoned numerous
times. "By so harassing protesters, the companies send a signal to
others to not stand in opposition," she says.
The government's main justification for giving "urgent" clearances to
mining and power companies is the shortage of power in the country.
About 44 percent of rural India doesn't have access to electricity
<http://www.ijera.com/papers/Vol4_issue12/Part%20-%203/H0412033943.pdf>,
but simply increasing the number of power plants doesn't seem to be the
solution. There are 11 mines and thermal power plants in Singhrauli
district, but most residents still do not have electricity. In Korba,
the power producing hub of Chhattisgarh, villagers live with 12-hour
power cuts and intermittent supply. "Energy insecurity is caused not by
forest conservation or the clearance process. The problem is [caused] by
prioritization and distribution," says Greenpeace India campaigner Priya
Pillai.
At Sao's photocopying shop in Tamnar in Raigarh, as they prepare for
another court hearing to retrieve their land, Sao asks Chaudhry if he
remembered the police inspector who worked at the station where they
both tried to file their complaints. "Do you remember the line he used
to say every time he saw us?" asks Sao.
Chaudhry nods. "How can I forget? 'When you bang your head against a
rock, it is your head that will bleed.'"
As she joins them, Lakra says that with every passing day, she is surer
that their fight is about dignity. "I give a little speech to myself
when I feel like giving up," she says. "I remind myself that I am no
less deserving of a say than a guy with a mining company. I want the
government to hear that loud and clear."
--
Peace Is Doable
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