Mining – India
1. Minister says Posco moving to different place; company denies
2. India Plans ‘Simpler’ Mining Law to Boost Investment (Update1)
3. Orissa mining Department starts departmental inquiry into alleged mining scam
4. Coal India plans subsidiary in Mozambique
5. Notice issued to RBTL on mining scam
6. India Mines Min says won't change minerals royalty
Mining – International
7. Gold Fields in purchase agreement with mining co.
8. National mine safety plan on the way
9. Obuasi MCE worried over mining effects in the area
10. Ukraine extends MoU with mining and metallurgical companies
11. Church hits big coal mine project
Other news
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14. Conference of Chief Ministers of Naxal-affected States held
15. Steel Minister asks SAIL to complete all ongoing expansion plans on time
16. Government to improve investment climate for mining sector : Handique
17. DDRS provides assistance to Mentally Retarded Children
18. New model schemes from NREGS to benefit citizens
19. Raise wages under NREGS to Rs 200 per day: Brinda asks Centre
Mining – India
Minister says Posco moving to different place; company denies
Tags: New Delhi
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Published by: Noor Khan
Published: Tue, 18 Aug 2009 at 16:19 IST
New Delhi, Aug 18 Faced with problems in acquiring land at the site of its proposed Rs 51,000 crore steel plant in Orissa, South Korean steel giant will slightly alter its location, Mines Minister B K Handique said today.
"Posco is facing problem of land (acquisition). Now recently they came to me. They have decided to move to a different place," he told reporters on the sidelines of conference here.
Later, the minister's office said that Posco will not move out of Orissa -- where the firm is awaiting iron ore leases -- but they may be moving to a nearby location.
When contacted Posco India Vice-President Vikas Sharan said, "There were never any plans to move from the site area in the past nor there are any such plans now. We are committed to the Orissa project."
Meanwhile speaking in Orissa, a Posco official admitted that some villagers at the proposed plant site are still opposed to the project, and efforts are on to win them over.
The South Korean steel maker has proposed setting up an integrated steel project in Orissa with a capacity of 12 million tonne per annum. .
India Plans ‘Simpler’ Mining Law to Boost Investment (Update1)
By Debarati Roy
Aug. 18 (Bloomberg) -- India aims to cut permit delays and attract overseas capital through “simpler” resource investment laws to help double mining’s contribution to the nation’s $1.2 trillion economy to at least 4 percent.
“We hope to increase it to 5 percent but expect it to increase to at least 4 percent in five years,” Mines Minister B.K. Handique said in an interview in New Delhi yesterday. The legislation will be presented to parliament in the winter session this year, he said.
Delays in securing mining licenses have undermined India’s efforts to win more investment, holding up construction of $32 billion projects announced ArcelorMittal and Posco, the world’s largest and sixth-largest steelmakers. The new law will develop the changes to the mineral policy last year that have so far failed to unlock development.
“It will be great if the government is able to cut down the long-winded procedure,” Niraj Shah, an analyst at Centrum Capital Ltd., said today. It will help companies who are serious about building operations in India, he said.
India, which holds the world’s fourth-largest bauxite deposits and the fifth-largest iron ore reserves according to McKinsey & Co., currently regulates mining through the five- decade old Mines & Minerals (Development & Regulation) Act.
“We will introduce a legal framework that ensures sustainable development and includes environment concerns,” Handique said. “We have to ensure it’s more broad-based as if there is resistance from people it will not be possible to translate the act into reality.”
Posco, ArcelorMittal
Land disputes and delays in allocating mining licenses have stopped South Korea-based Posco from proceeding with potentially the biggest overseas investment in India. The company is yet to begin building a $12 billion, 12 million metric ton steel plant in eastern Orissa state, planned for more than five years.
“The policy is aimed to make the rules more transparent and simpler,” Handique said. “Posco is a bad precedent but we know that overseas companies want to invest in India and transparent policy will help that,” he said, adding that he also expects the law changes to spark investment from domestic companies.
“We hope the government approves the mine license soon, then we would like to secure land and start the project as soon as possible,” Choi Doo Jin, a spokesman at Posco, said by phone from Seoul today.
ArcelorMittal has proposed setting up two mills in India, one in Orissa and another in Jharkhand -- with a total capacity of 24 million tons. It signed an accord for the Jharkhand mill in mid- 2005, followed by the one in Orissa.
Besides companies, countries including South Africa, Namibia and Colombia have shown interest in investing in the mining sector, Handique said.
To contact the reporter on this story: Debarati Roy in Mumbai atdroy5@bloomberg.net
Last Updated: August 18, 2009 00:42 EDT
Orissa mining Department starts departmental inquiry into alleged mining scam
Report by Orissadiary correspondent; Bhubaneswar: Orissa mining Department has initiated a departmental inquiry into the incident. This was said by the secretary of the mining department Ashok Dalwai.
The secretary, in an order on Monday, summoned the owner of the Ram Bahadur Thakur Ltd to personally appear before the department by September 4 next.
The secretary sent a number of queries including how the director of mines Rabindra Narayan Sahu allowed RLBT to guard the mining spot.
In his reply, Sahu reportedly said that he gave the permission using his discretionary powers. Meanwhile, the State Vigilance is on the lookout of Sahu who is on leave for two days, official sources said. Earlier, Vigilance director Anup Patnaik had said that Sahu's role in the mining scam could not be ignored. Despite knowing that the company did not possess lease permission for carrying out mining activities, the present Director of Mines allowed him to guard the mines area.
This is illegal, Patnaik had stated. The State Vigilance has already sent deputy director mines Madan Mohan Biswal, Jt directors mines Ganeswar Mohanty and Dhirendra Kumar Mishra, mining officer Routray Murmu, forest range officer Dillip Kumar Beura and forester Guali Kamalakanta Pradhan to jail. Meanwhile, SP Vigilance Debadutta Patnaik said that the anti-corruption wing is planning to examine Sahu in connection with the mining scam.
Coal India plans subsidiary in Mozambique
Jayajit Dash / Bhubaneswar August 18, 2009, 1:17 IST
Coal India Ltd (CIL), which was awarded two exploratory coal blocks in Mozambique in March this year, has decided to set up a wholly-owned subsidiary in that country to expedite the exploration process.
“CIL will form a separate company for carrying out coal mining activities in Mozambique. This company will be a fully-owned subsidiary of CIL and will forge a joint venture (JV) with a state run mining firm in Mozambique,” a top CIL official told Business Standard.
The CIL subsidiary will have an 85 per cent stake in the JV, while the remaining 15 per cent will be held by the Mozambique-based mining company. The modalities of the JV company were yet to be decided, but a breakthrough was expected during the upcoming visit of a high-level Indian delegation to Mozambique. The delegation, which includes the Union coal ministry officials as well as the top brass of CIL, is expected to take up the issue of the proposed JV company to start exploration of the coal blocks.
In March this year, CIL was awarded two exploratory coal blocks — A1 and A2 — in Tete province of Mozambique, having an estimated reserve of one billion tonnes. While the exploration of these two coal blocks, spread over 224 sq km, was set to commence within a few months, the mining activities were expected to begin after three and a half years.
Prior to carrying out mining operations in Mozambique, the Navratna coal company was to distribute artificial limbs in that war-ravaged nation. CIL has also announced the setting up of a premier mining institute in Mozambique, on the lines of the Indian School of Mines, Dhanbad.
Apart from Mozambique, CIL had also stepped up its efforts to acquire stakes in coking and thermal coal assets in Australia. CIL has called for Expressions of Interest (EoIs) from mining firms in Australia in this connection by the end of August. The coal major was keen on entering into a strategic partnership with Australian mining firms having proven expertise in mining for developing the coal assets.
Notice issued to RBTL on mining scam
BS Reporter / Kolkata/ Bhubaneswar August 18, 2009, 0:33 IST
As part of the administrative enquiry into the multi-crore mining scam in Joda area, the Orissa government has issued notice to the Ram Bahadur Thakur Limited (RBTL) to ascertain the locus standi of the company to issue the power of attorney to another person named Shakti Ranjan Das.
The company will also have to explain whether the power of attorney was issued as per the provisions of the law. RBTL has been asked to reply by 4 September.
There were allegation of rampant theft and illegal mining of iron and manganese ores from the mines held by Ram Bahadur Thakur Limited (RBTL) at Rudukela and Katasahi in Keonjhar district. The state government had ordered both administrative and vigilance enquiry into the alleged scam.
Similarly, the director of mines and deputy director, mines (Joda) have been issued notice to explain under what circumstances they allowed deployment of security by a private organisation keeping the government in dark, when the mining lease for the patch was not granted to the person concerned.
“ As part of the administrative enquiry we have asked the RBTL to explain the mandate to give power of attorney to somebody elese. The company will have to explain whether the power of attorney issued was as per the provisions of the law and what is its latest position”, Ashok Dalwai, secretary, steel and mines said.
He said, the mining officials have been issued notice to explain whether the permission given by them were as per the law. The step taken by the government assumes importance as there was allegation that RBTL had been liquidated and the mining officials showed undue favour to the company.
India Mines Min says won't change minerals royalty
Tue Aug 18, 2009 1:29pm IST
NEW DELHI, Aug 18 (Reuters) - India's Mines Minister said on Tuesday the government would not give in to the trade's demand to change the new mining royalty structure, which is expected to introduce a 10 percent ad valorem duty.
"We will notify immediately the new royalty structure. We have already decided the royalty structure and there is no scope to make any changes." Mines Minister B.K. Handique told reporters.
He did not disclose the new structure. (Reporting by Ratnajyoti Dutta)
http://in.reuters.com/article/domesticNews/idINDEB00089220090818
Mining – International
Gold Fields in purchase agreement with mining co.
Associated Press, 08.17.09, 04:17 PM EDT
HARTFORD, Conn. -- Gold Fields Ltd. said Monday that a subsidiary expanded its stake in a mining company, paying for it with more than half its share in a joint venture.
Gold Fields ( GFI - news - people ) Dominican Republic BVI Ltd. entered into a purchase agreement with GoldQuest Mining Corp. Gold Fields Dominican Republic agreed to transfer its 60 percent interest in a joint venture between the two companies to GoldQuest.
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In exchange, GoldQuest agreed to issue 8.6 million shares of its company to GF Dominican Republic or an affiliate.
With the completion of the deal, Gold Fields subsidiaries will have an aggregate of 14.0 million common shares of GoldQuest and 1.2 million common share purchase warrants. With the common shares, and if the warrants are exercised, Gold Fields will own about 20 percent of GoldQuest's issued and outstanding common shares.
The transaction is subject to closing conditions.
Shares of the Johannesburg-based Gold Fields slipped 72 cents, or nearly 6 percent, to $11.60 in afternoon trading on the New York Stock Exchange.
National mine safety plan on the way
Tuesday, 18/08/2009
The mining industry and the Federal Government are close to finalising a national occupational health and safety plan.
Eighteen people have died on Australian mine sites in the last year, almost double the annual average.
The Minerals Council of Australia says part of the problem is that different states have different workplace safety rules.
The council's safety director, Megan Davison, says the new legislation will see mines adopt a single, national plan.
"So that any worker, working on any mine site across the country, is comfortable in their knowledge, have the appropriate training, and when they move around, they'll understand that the site is very similar in its processes to a site 2000 kilometres away," she says.
Obuasi MCE worried over mining effects in the area
Last Updated: Tuesday, 18 August 2009, 2:70 GMT Previous Page
The Municipal Chief Executive for Obuasi is worried over the negative impact of mining on Obuasi and its environs.
Alexander Ackon says Obuasi has suffered lots of setback, particularly, the collapse of local and indigenous trading activities, bringing in its trail high rate of unemployment.
Mr. Ackon says AngloGold Ashanti which used to employ 15,000 people to feed 75, 000 dependants now manages only four thousand 500 employees with beneficiary families of 22 thousand.
He fears more people employed in the mining sector could soon be on their way out to worsen the unemployment rate, adding that, the picture of unemployment is different from that of other places.
Lands taken over by mining has also affected agriculture compelling unemployed youth to resort to illegal mining popularly known as galamsey for survival.
He said though efforts had been made in previous years to secure galamsey miners portions of land out of concession of mining giant Anglo Gold Ashanti to operate, that has fallen on deaf ears.
Mr. Ackon advises the people of Obuasi to explore alternative means of livelihood instead of relying on mining.
He blames mining for the collapse of local economy where almost everything is traded in nearby Kumasi from food stuffs to textiles.
Mr. Ackon says he will encourage private businessmen and investors to invest in job creation ventures in efforts to revive local economy while efforts are made improve informal trading activities.
Ohemeng Tawiah, Nhyira Fm-Kumasi
Ukraine extends MoU with mining and metallurgical companies
Tuesday, 18 Aug 2009
It is reported that the Ukrainian cabinet of ministers has prolonged until the end of 2009 the MoU with the country’s mining and metallurgical companies, stipulating that the benefits will be granted if the companies reduce their prices for the domestic market to levels not higher than their export prices.
According to the cabinet of ministers decision No 935 dated July 22nd 2009, among the other conditions for granting of benefits is the absence of debts to the budget to Ukraine pension fund to Ukraine state gas company Naftogaz and payment of wages.
In November 2008 the Ukraine government and the country mining and metallurgical companies signed an MoU aimed at the minimization of the consequences of the economic crisis in the industry in particular at the stabilization of prices for ore, coal and steel products, the maintenance of jobs, salary levels and other social securities for employees and also the development of the Ukrainian domestic market.
Within the framework of the MoU, the Ukrainian cabinet of ministers by its decision No 925, dated October 14th 2008, granted benefits for the domestic chemical as well as mining and metallurgical companies, i.e. imposed a moratorium on the increase of railway transportation and electricity supply tariffs. Initially, the decision was effective until January 1st 2009, but after a series of prolongations was extended until October 1st 2009. The MoU expired on January 1st 2009 however, the tax benefits continued to be granted to the country’s mining and metallurgical companies.
(Sourced from SteelOrbis)
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http://steelguru.com/news/index/2009/08/18/MTA3NTU1/Ukraine_extends_MoU_with_mining_and_metallurgical_companies.html
Church hits big coal mine project
Catanduanes folk buck P6.2-B undertaking
By Fernan Gianan
Inquirer Southern Luzon, Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 00:55:00 08/18/2009
Filed Under: Environmental Issues, Mining and quarrying,Biodiversity, Energy
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VIRAC, CATANDUANES—The Catholic Church and other groups are objecting to a plan by a firm linked to business tycoon Enrique Razon Jr. to extract coal worth P6.2 billion in the province, saying mining would destroy its forest cover and biodiversity, cause flooding, and pollute its waterways.
The groups also claim that the Department of Energy awarded 7,000 hectares of land in the province to Monte Oro Resources Energy Inc. in 2005 for coal exploration without public consultation.
The large swathe of land assigned to Monte Oro in the towns of San Andres, Caramoran and Panganiban is equivalent to the land area of 132 Luneta Parks or three times bigger than Makati City.
Razon has an interest in Monte Oro Grid Resources, a wholly owned subsidiary of Monte Oro Resources Energy, a company formed in 2005 to invest in mining, oil and gas, and infrastructure in the Philippines.
Monte Oro Grid is a leading member of the consortium that won the bidding for the power grids of National Transmission Corp. in 2007 with an offer of $3.95 billion.
Additional 8,000 hectares
The Church and other groups are also opposing the plan of the energy department to award an additional 8,000 hectares in three towns in the province to a private firm for the mining of some P9.4 billion worth of coal deposits.
The new area will cover the jurisdictions of 14 barangays (village) in the towns of Caramoran, Panganiban and Viga.
The areas identified by the energy department for coal mining encroach on the remaining 60,000 hectares of forest land of Catanduanes, according to opponents of coal mining.
A report by provincial consultant Manuel V. Mapa said disturbance of the ground surface and forested areas during mining operations would increase soil erosion and cause flooding in the towns of Viga, Panganiban, Bagamanoc, San Miguel, Bato, Manambrag in San Andres, and Hitoma and Milaviga in Caramoran.
Mine tailings would also endanger waterways and the sea.
Loss of carbon sink
Mapa said coal mining would leave the forests open to massive exploitation from kaingeros (swidden farmers), “farm-and-run” settlers and illegal loggers, which would result in the loss of forest cover capable of absorbing 8.7 million tons of carbon dioxide.
“Mining in the watershed area of Hitoma river will affect Suweco operations and deprive power consumers an estimated P20 million per year in savings,” Mapa said. Sunwest Water and Electricity Co. operates mini-hydro power plants.
Absence of consultation
In a statement of concern read in all churches on the island on March 1, Bishop Manolo A. de los Santos of the Diocese of Virac appealed to local and national leaders to stop all mining operations in the province in the absence of public consultation with affected sectors.
Catandunganons have the right to know the disastrous effects mining would bring to the island and its people, De los Santos said.
“We don’t want our island and our people to suffer from such tragedies brought about by irresponsible mining activity,” he said.
The bishop asked the faithful to support and stand by the diocese in the struggle against large-scale mining and the blatant exploitation of the island’s rich natural resources.
30 new coal areas
His statement came a week after the Department of Energy closed the 2009 bidding for 30 new coal areas in the country, including Area 10 in Catanduanes covering 8,000 hectares.
In Panganiban town, a prospective miner showed up at the municipal council two months ago with a coal mining contract duly approved by the Department of Energy.
Policarpio M. Torres presented the documents to the municipal council on June 15 and sought its endorsement for his mining operation in the town, according to Panganiban Councilor Remelito Cabrera.
He quoted Torres, who is from Tambongon, Viga, as saying that he (Torres) would not insist on pursuing the operation if the municipal council would not endorse it.
Cabrera said the energy department permit that gave Torres the go-signal to proceed with coal extraction would go against the sentiments of the municipal council.
The council has passed a resolution objecting to the inclusion of 2,000 hectares of the town’s territory in the coal operating contract of Monte Oro.
Angelo Reyes singed permit
Documents showed that Energy Secretary Angelo T. Reyes signed Small-Scale Coal Mining Permit No. 2008-018 issued to Torres on Oct. 30, 2008 covering a parcel of coal-bearing land in Barangay San Miguel, Panganiban.
Under the permit valid for five years, Torres can extract 7,333 metric tons a year at Campo Ermitaño under the supervision of Monte Oro when its coal operating contract (COC) is converted into development and production COC.
All coal produced by Torres will be sold to Monte Oro, according to the permit.
While the operations are not yet under Monte Oro, Torres would have to hire a full-time mining engineer to oversee mining operations.
Torres is also mandated to pay the national government 3 percent of the gross sales of the coal produced in the area based on the sales invoice.
A coal production of 1.5 million metric tons in five years would earn Monte Oro P6.2 billion in gross revenues. Local governments are expected to get P9 million in taxes and workers, P10 million.
No response from Reyes
In a resolution dated Nov. 17, 2008, the council said there were no records showing that the energy department and other agencies had complied with the provisions of the Local Government Code requiring prior consultation with local government units, nongovernment organizations and other sectors to be affected by the proposed coal mining.
Councilor Cabrera said the Department of Energy, to which a copy of the resolution was personally delivered by Mayor Gregorio Angeles, did not respond.
A group calling itself Katandungan Kontra Mina is seeking to hold an information campaign to warn the people of the loss of Catanduanes’ precious forests and watersheds should coal mining proceed.
Information drive
At a meeting at the Diocese of Virac Social Action Foundation Inc. on July 9, the group agreed to conduct the information drive in villages, town plazas and schools.
“Whether we like it or not, we need the help of all the people of Catanduanes in stopping any mining activity or in recalling the permits issued to a small-scale mining permittee,” Fr. Laudemer Jose Gapaz told the group.
Opponents claim that the mining activity would benefit only Monte Oro but damage from landslides, flooding and reduced water flow to rivers would cost more than whatever local government units would get from mining.
Water flow in the 11 town’s major rivers would be reduced by 25-35 percent and water would be polluted, they said.
“We are afraid that Torres is just being used by Monte Oro to operate large-scale mining in the province,” Gapaz said, noting that the permit was issued in the absence of public consultations and an environmental compliance certificate (ECC).
Without ECC
In Quezon City, Environment Secretary Lito Atienza said the Monte Oro project in Catanduanes had not been issued an ECC.
Atienza said all coal mining projects of more than 20 hectares should get an ECC from the main office of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources.
An ECC for a mining project covers permits like an authority to transfer trees, water rights and endorsement from local government units, according to Director Julian Amador of the Environmental Management Bureau.
Remaining biodiversity
The Federation of Irrigators Association of Catanduanes, and the United Katandunganons Against Graft & Corruption (Ukag) also opposed any kind of mining in the province.
“We cannot allow the approval of a mining operation done in haste, especially what is at stake is the province’s remaining biodiversity,” Ukag head Eddie Rodulfo said.
Clemente Bautista of the Kalikasan-People’s Network for the Environment said the approval of the project violated the Arroyo administration’s commitment to fight climate change.
“Coal, even before being burned, is dirty and carbon intensive. It changes land use, dislocates communities and destroys our fragile ecosystems,” Bautista said. With reports from Juan Escandor Jr., Inquirer Southern Luzon and Alcuin Papa
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GROUND ZERO PATRIOTS
Raise High the Roof Beams
An adivasi woman takes on India’s largest steel plant. A doctor leads thousands of farmers in their fight for a river. A young urbanite is jailed as she tries to secure rights for forest communities. As India turns 62, TEHELKA profiles those who are fighting to keep its democracy alive
EVEN THE most cynical of generations wonder: why did giants once roam the world, when dwarves now surround us? How is it that those who built our nation found time for more than the task of waking millions, for more than the intricate clockwork of statecraft? When did they sit down long enough to forge new ways of compassion, of courage, of living? To write enormous tracts, translate the ancients? What were they, to use the easy parlance of hallucinogens, on?
It has been 62 years after the giants won us a country and built the political scaffolding to make it kinder, more just. But greed and cruelty are still part of our public lives. When people stand teetering on the edge, we carelessly push. When the path of least resistance runs over the homes, fields and forests of others, we charge on. It would seem like the gods have departed, leaving behind only the vulnerable and the revelers.
But the giants still live on in odd corners. When novelist and sociologist Susan Visvanathan visited the fishworkers of Kerala, a fisherman asked her, “Thakazhy Sivasankara Pillai made millions out of his novel [Chemeen] on the life of fisherpeople. Are you also going to do the same? I wake up at two in the morning and I get nothing.”
Magline and Peter Thayil, two leaders of the fishworkers’ movement are just as resistant to mythologising. Regardless of their Biblical names, the Jesus-invoking sea, the romance of it all, they are people who wake up at two in the morning and get on with their lives’ work. They protect the livelihoods of lakhs of people by ensuring that we and our trawlers don’t eat the oceans out of fish, that no one buys and sells the sea in the fine mesh of arcane contracts.
Elsewhere, others are jailed and assaulted for protecting what ought to belong to the commons, not shredded into toothpicks. A young doctor in Karnataka joins thousands of farmers and the urban poor in a decade-long political struggle. A woman in Assam becomes the first in her village to go to college but cannot forget the fear caused by the soldiers who roam her lands with impunity. A young man in Orissa realises that the dozens of struggles across the state need to come together and he is the one to do it. A young adivasi woman in Jharkhand comes to the same realisation. She once ran a tea-shop and is now a journalist, but like the Bhakti poet Akka Mahadevi, she must wander from village to village awakening her people to the approaching fangs of a steel empire. Another empire poisons a whole city, thousands die, and decades later a man, battles the false memories and absurd lies that seek to hide the stillseeping poison.
The fate that awaits these strange, sleepless beings is not — unlike in the case of the giants who built India — the crowns and sceptres of a grateful nation. We are instead more likely to be enraged. If they must be misguided, we argue, let them do it without discomfiting us, depriving us of the soft light and canned music we are used to. Inevitably we call them traitors for warring against the nation.
Even when we are sympathetic to their tireless work, their ambitions seem against the natural order of things — because the natural order of things are made for us — in the same way that Indians claiming the right to independence must have seemed preposterous to the British.
The fate that awaits these strange, sleepless beings is not the crowns and sceptres of a grateful nation
We have hard work ahead, warned Nehru in the midnight hour. Sure, most of us responded, and went off whistling and thinking of lunch. But luckily, in the place of the giants who are gone, others have sprung, prepared to sleep on railway platforms and footpaths, to have their young bodies broken from lathis, their voices hoarse from shouting — all to preserve democracy, to protect us from ourselves.
This week TEHELKA meets some of these giants from across the nation. They — like Richard Wilbur’s prophet — are “madeyed from stating the obvious” but refuse to blink. And someday in the future someone will ask: did they really exist? Were they as tall as they seem? And we can answer, yes.
NISHA SUSAN
Miracles Among The Fish
MAGLINE PETER, 41, leads a massive movement of fishworkers that is learning to fight everything from climate change to superstition
IMAGING: S THOMAS/TEHELKA
TEN LAKH fishermen and fisherwomen, in 222 coastal villages and 113 inland fishery villages, along Kerala’s 590 km coastline. Chances are Magline Peter has met all of them at some point. Every now and then one of the women will tease Magline and ask her what she is so worked up about. “I am angry because I have to protect my community, my father and mother, my family and friends, my sea, my coast,” says Magline.
Magline is the state convenor of the Theeradesa Mahila Vedi, the women’s wing of the Kerala Swathanthra Malsya Thozhilali Federation (KSMTF or Kerala Independent Fishworkers Federation). The massive community organisation is no windy, exploitative trade union weighed down by acronyms or political parties. Though the federation was once synonymous with the Latin Catholic community, there has been decisive action to make it secular and inclusive of other religions, all the way up from the trenches to the leadership. Magline’s community- based organisation is a live-wire entity that responds quickly and consistently to the challenges faced by fishworkers in an extremely difficult world: greedy trawlers, globalisation, climate change.
Magline became an active community leader after she met her husband Peter Thayil, a fellow activist with the KSMTF who was organising meetings at her village Veliyaveli in 1986, though her mother was already an active member of the union. Today, Magline’s daughter, studying for an MBA, sees herself as a part of this movement. Magline has been key in evolving the strong women’s movement among the fisherpeople.
TODAY THEY MUST BUY AND SELL FISH IN A MARKET AS UNPREDICTABLE AND SHARK-FILLED AS THE SEAS
Traditionally, in south Kerala women used to collect and sell fish caught by their community’s men. Today they must buy fish from big contractors and deal with a market as unpredictable and as shark-filled as the seas. The state did not even recognise them as part of the fishing industry. It took TMV leaders like Magline a long while to change that.
To understand how far TMV had to go one has to hear about a seemingly trivial concession they gained from the state. In the 1980s women fish vendors were not allowed to travel in buses or trains with their baskets. The way to the market meant miles of walking. Work, family, leisure and livelihood suffered. Fisherwomen had been injured when the helpful public pushed them out of buses. TMV organised massive protests that eventually led to increased bus services from villages to markets and even a train bogey on one major route.
At the markets themselves the vendors faced violence, sexual assault and attacks from goondas and politicians. This apart from the assumption that they did not need infrastructure to conduct business. Over the years they have picketed, held rallies, resisted arrest and downed their baskets, and won their livelihood inch by bloodied inch. All this while combating a culture that displays its mixed feelings about its powerful women through superstitions (such as the one that if women sit with untied hair when the men go fishing, there will be huge waves in the sea).
THEY HAVE RESISTED ARREST AND DOWNED THEIR BASKETS AND WON THEIR LIVELIHOODS INCH BY BLOODIED INCH
Magline has a humbling ability to switch from the local to the global, from the seemingly small to the massive. She can talk about state-wide representation for women vendors or climate change with equal passion. Magline herself has participated in agitations with Sardar Sarovar project-affected villagers in the Narmada valley, with dalit and tribal people fighting for land rights across India, with people affected by industrial pollution, with the women’s movement.
It seemed natural that eventually her organisation played a key role in founding the World Forum of Fisherpeoples — a necessary formation when their future is affected by a state that thinks it can give away fishing rights to American, Scandinavian and Japanese fishing vessels, dredging the sea for their dinner plates. Or when fishworkers are affected by natural disasters, the WTO or fish diseases.
Everyday, Magline says, she gains courage from the lakhs of women fishworkers and vendors who are financially independent — strong and opinionated women who despite the most violent state action are able to continue doing what they do, while also fighting for their livelihoods, sea and coast.
NITHIN MANAYATH
The Bhopal Express
SATINATH SARANGI, 55, had planned to stay for a week. Decades later, he is still fighting on behalf of those affected by the gas tragedy
IMAGING: SHAILENDRA PANDEY/TEHELKA
HOW DOES a nation come to make swine flu the most talked about disease while 900 people die of TB everyday? Is the number of affected directly proportional to our collective amnesia? But there are always people like Satinath ‘Sathyu’ Sarangi who won’t ever let you forget that 23,000 people died of exposure- related illnesses in Bhopal post the 1984 disaster, and more are dying still, that 1,50,000 survivors are still chronically ill, children are born with growth disorders, TB and cancers are far more prevalent in the gas-affected population.
But collective amnesia is the least of Sathyu’s problems as he, along with his fellow activists and survivors, are forced to ‘haggle with the state’ over the number of affected people, over the compensation amounts to be given, over the levels of land and water pollution that still exist. “One year they say high contamination of groundwater and in a later report they claim no contamination. It’s stupid, but most of your energies go into battling these absurdities.”
Sathyu, had left a Ph.D in metallurgy and was working with Kishore Bharati, an NGO working among adivasis outside Bhopal, when he heard news of the disaster. “I thought I’d be there for a week.” A quarter of a century later, he’s still there — helping in the mobilisation of affected communities, fighting for legal claims, and in providing medical support as part of the Bhopal Group for Information and Action, which he set up in 1986.
He is also the managing trustee of the Sambhavna Clinic which provides free medical care and is instrumental in researching the long-term effects of the gas exposure. But doing medical work with the disenfranchised seems a surefire way to get on the bad side of the Indian State. In 1986, he was arrested for giving sodium thiosulphate injections, which acts as a detoxicant to poisonous gases, particularly methyl isocyanate. In 1996, he was handcuffed outside the court where the compensation hearings were taking place and brutally beaten up by 30 policemen, who broke four sticks on his back. It took a call from the presiding judge to get him released. “I fought for a year and a half to ensure that action be taken. Four officials were reprimanded,” he says with a laugh.
Sathyu, with a gamcha tied firmly on his head, continues to confront the absurd lies that are constantly produced by the DOW Chemicals of the world andvc the colluding State, with the firm truth of the many survivors walking with him.
NITHIN MANAYATH
The Tidy Rebel
ALOK AGARWAL, 43, was destined for the soft life of an IIT boy. Instead, he courted arrests and broken bones to stop the Maheshwar dam
IMAGING: SHAILENDRA PANDEY/TEHELKA
ALOK AGARWAL had started on the straight and narrow at IIT Kharagpur. Deeply inspired by Gandhi and Aurobindo, he began teaching in a nearby village, while also repairing the school building. Alok was clear he did not want to become a pampered NRI. Instead, he travelled in the hinterlands to understand issues of development. The Narmada Bachao Andolan (NBA) was picking up steam around 1990 when Alok decided to join it in Madhya Pradesh (MP). ‘My parents wanted me to marry, have a family. Their disappointment lasted for years. When they finally visited me, they went back happy’, he says.
As an NBA activist, Alok spearheaded a massive grassroots movement, especially around the Maheshwar Dam, one of the 30 large dams that are part of the Narmada Valley Development Project. Maheshwar had the potential to displace as many as 15,000 families in the Nimad region while submerging 61 villages. Thanks to intense campaigning over years, international investors withdrew. In 1998 the NBA forced the government to set up a task force which recommended a halt to the construction till a participatory review was completed.
‘MY PARENTS WANTED ME TO MARRY, HAVE A FAMILY. THEIR DISAPPOINTMENT LASTED FOR YEARS. UNTIL THEY VISITED’
These long years Alok travelled from village to village everyday, going without food and sleeping on cramped floors. Jailed and beaten badly several times, Alok was once paraded in Barwani district by the police in an attempt to disgrace him. After 19 years his honorarium of Rs 800 has grown to Rs 3,000. Alok owns nothing except his clothes; even the cell phone he uses belongs to the movement. Says Chittaroopa Palit, another NBA activist, “Alok possesses tremendous energy and joy. Despite the relentless struggle and the exhaustion, he has managed to preserve his focus because of his practice of meditation. He has been keeping work- related diaries for 20 years. Each page reflects the tidy thinker that he is.”
Says Clifton D’Rozario, an engineer who spent six years with the NBA, “At one protest, the police were gunning for activists, beating them up brutally and jailing them. A few of us, including Alok, were on the run from the cops for around ten days. Despite the dangers, Alok stayed calm, and always thought in the interest of the people.” Through years of litigation and protests, the dam has only been partly constructed. Perhaps through Alok and others, it will stay that way.
AMRITA NANDY-JOSHI
The Fugitive Student
BHAGABAN MAJHI, 32, lost his faith in the law’s sincerity of purpose. But he still believes that one day Orissa’s adivasis will be a powerful force
IMAGING: DEEPU/TEHELKA
WHEN BHAGABAN Majhi was in class VIII, he didn’t really look at his textbooks. He was busy reading his teacher’s training manual to learn more about the Constitution of India. He finished class VIII but never went further. He was looking for a different kind of education — one that would show him how he and other adivasis could access the rights promised by the Constitution. Years later, as the leader of the Prakrutik Sampark Surakhya Parishad (PSSP) — a movement fighting against the bauxite mining project in Kashipur, Orissa, that would displace thousands of adivasis with disastrous environmental consequences — he is still learning, he says. A sense of responsibility is what initially drove him towards PSSP. If only adivasis were aware of the laws that guarantee protection from exploitation. If only they knew that the courts can shield them from injustice. That the local politicians and policemen were denying the adivasis their rights. He wanted to share with his people his discovery of the Land Reforms Act, the proper implementation of which could perhaps pave their way out of poverty. A few years later, his naivete dawned on him. Says Bhagaban, “We have to forget what the Constitution promises us. The government serves only capitalists. Fighting as a collective is the only way we can make them even hear our voices. The longer the fight, the more we can expose the government for what it is — a gatekeeper of the rich! We want to try to unite all the adivasi, dalit, peasant and landless peoples' movements in Orissa — present a single front that the government just cannot ignore.”
BHAGABAN SAYS, ‘FORGET THE CONSTITUTION. THE GOVERNMENT SERVES ONLY THE CAPITALISTS’
To PSSP, government schemes that provide rice at Rs 2 per kg or even the much touted rural employment scheme are placebos and sedatives. Why else would the government carelessly demolish adivasis’ villages or dismiss their traditional mode of development while raiding Orissa’s natural resources?
When three people were shot dead by the police in Maikanch village in 2000, PSSP rallies turned out over 7,000 enraged adivasis. The severe state oppression that PSSP has faced — hundreds arrested in 2005 and 2006 besides periodic lathi charge incidents to disperse protest rallies — is evidence enough to them of the extent to which the government will go to not listen. What happens next? “We continue,” he says.
SANJANA
The Pied Piper Of Parks
ROMA, 44, lobbied in favour of the Forest Rights Act against a State impervious to the possibility of a civil war
IMAGING:SHAILENDRA PANDEY/TEHELKA
ROMA HAD just finished a masters degree in social work from a Delhi college. She found herself gripped with the anxieties of a young urban woman. “I was scared my parents would get me married if I stayed in the city,” she says. “I wanted to explore and understand rural India before settling down.” But Roma never married or settled down. Her exploration into the interiors of Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan’s villages and the forests of Uttar Pradesh chang ed her in fundamental ways. She began reading Ambedkar and Bhagat Singh, and understanding “the politics of a forest life.”
Two decades later, Roma, 44, is one of the founders of the National Forum of Forest People and Forest Workers. The forum was instrumental in lobbying for the landmark Forest Rights Act passed in 2006, which recognised the rights of adivasis to their own forests for the first time in India. Initially, the act was only meant for scheduled castes and tribes. “We fought to have it amended to include other forest dwellers who may not be adivasis,” she says. “The adivasis wanted it changed to prevent a civil war.”
In August 2007, Roma organised a mass protest in UP to have the Forest Rights Act implemented. She was in Lucknow for a meeting days later when she heard the police may arrest her. Roma returned to her base in Sonbhadra because “it’s better to be arrested in front of the public.” She was booked under the Forest Act, and under criminal sections of the IPC. Soon, she was labelled a Maoist and booked under the National Security Act. The locals wreaked havoc for the 20 days Roma was in jail. For 20 days, thousands of adivasis from three districts, mostly women, blocked roads, beat up the police, got beaten up, got condemned as Maoists, but refused to budge. The Mayawati government had to revoke the NSA. “I got out only because of the people’s protest,” Roma says. “If there was a BJP government, I would be an unknown Binayak Sen.”
‘IF THE BJP WAS IN POWER, I’D BE AN UNKNOWN BINAYAK SEN,’ SAYS ROMA. SHE TOO WAS LABELLED A MAOIST
Roma’s journey began as a college graduate working with rural development NGOs. “They were just a delivery service,” she says. “There was no attempt to bring a qualitative change in the lives of people. The moment the project stops, everything stops.” Opposed to social work that “leads from the outside,” Roma searched for ways to immerse herself inside rural communities. She found the opportunity in the Rajari National Park spread across Uttarakhand and UP. There she lived in dense forests with indigenous people who cooked with forest wood and earned their livelihood by making ropes from wild grass. But every time the adivasis took from the forest, forest officials harassed them with false cases of illegally damaging State property. Desperate, the adivasis went out at night, only to be trampled over by wild elephants.
“A man is worth 1.5 paise,” forest officials said when Roma asked for help, “but an elephant is worth 1.5 lakh.” In 1992, Roma spearheaded a local movement against forest department exploitation — Ghar Shetra Mazdoor Sangharsh Samiti. “We declared we are not afraid, and demanded our rights,” Roma says. After the Samiti formed, locals marched into the forest by day, united. The forest officials had to back off. In 1996, the UP government agreed to make official forest depots and passed an order which “allowed” adivasis “to take grass and fuel wood from the forest.” It was levied on five other national parks in UP.
EVERY TIME THE ADIVASIS TOOK WILD GRASS AND WOOD, FOREST OFFICIALS SLAPPED FALSE CASES ON THEM
Roma now lives and works in Sonbhadra district, in the Kamo region of UP, rich with minerals, fossil fuels and rock paintings. Producing 10,000 MW of power, Sonbhadra is also called the ‘energy capital’ of India. The 500 villages in the district have seen no benefits. “Their lands were transferred illegally to the forest department and declared forest land,” Roma says, “so there has been no development here.” She spearheaded the formation of a Kamo Shetra Mahila Mazdur Kisan Sangharsh Samiti, and inspired locals to fight the State and the police. Adivasis and farmers united; they reclaimed 20,000 hectares of forest land in the Kamo region. “My biggest achievement is forming groups of people and awakening a collective political consciousness among them,” she says. “They are moving away from Maoist control. Their consciousness is far beyond the Maoists. They’ll do anything to fight for their rights.”
TUSHA MITTAL
The Girl Against The Boot
ANJALI DAIMARY, 45, has waged war to control the excesses of the armed forces in the North-East
IMAGING: UB PHOTOS/TEHELKA
ACTIVIST ANJALI Daimary marvels that it has been 62 years since India achieved independence. The fruits of all those years, however, have entirely bypassed her native village of Adala Khasibari in Assam’s Udalguri district. Though the village is only 130 kms from Guwahati, it still has no electricity or motorable roads.
Indeed, it was only because of the foresight of her father, a priest, that 45-yearold Daimary was able to complete her own studies. Still the only female graduate from her village, she is now pursuing her PhD on changes in Bodo culture.
Deeply interested in the life of the Bodos, she traces the community’s struggles through the 1980s to the present day. As in most conflict situations, the women suffered the most as the two main militant groups, the Bodo Liberation Tigers (BLT) and the National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB), waged their battles. Bodo women faced the brunt of raids by the police and security forces. Many were tortured, molested and raped.
In 1992, Daimary formed the Bodo Women Justice Forum to bring about awareness of the community’s rights. Though only women are members, they discuss issues pertaining to the entire community. “We used to go from village to village to mobilise people. We urged them to be conscious participants,” she says.
But their task was not easy. The Forum’s General Secretary Gulapi Basumatary was shot dead in December 1996 while attending a village meeting. Daimary herself was arrested under TADA in 1993. A mother of two and the head of the department of Major Indian Languages (MIL) at Barama College, she was finally acquitted in 2005.
In 1996 and 1997, she had for the first time represented the Bodo tribe at the UN Working Group on Indigenous Population (UNWGIP) in Geneva. She is happy that there is now a UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (UNPFII) that discusses human rights issues of indigenous populations.
“When we take up rape cases, the authorities fudge the reports or witnesses turn hostile. Many innocent young men are picked up and killed instead of being tried as per law. At least we have been able to check atrocities,” she says. One day soon, Anjali Daimary plans to bring together all the indigenous peoples of the North-East to fight for their rights.
TERESA REHMAN
Doctor Strange Love
VASU HV, 34, has been working for the rights of the urban poor for a decade and scorns the class bias that thinks of his life as sacrifice
IMAGING: S RADHAKRISHNA/TEHELKA
IT IS difficult to cut through Dr Vasu HV’s diffidence. Eleven years in the public eye have not weakened his resolve to keep himself in the background. The only way to get him to reveal anything about himself is to talk of the movement. The movement in question is the one initiated by the Karnataka Janapara Vedike, an organisation engaged in fighting for the rights of farmers, slum dwellers and unorganised workers. The Vedike now has an established presence in over 10 districts of the state. At its opening convention, Vasu was unanimously elected to the post of state general secretary. It was a testament to the commitment of the activist who, even as a child growing up in a Brahmin household in rural Karnataka, was deeply shocked by caste inequalities.
“Every district committee of the Vedike has the flexibility to decide on the struggles that it will take up. Though we do have centralised programmes, this flexibility allows the organisation to be more responsive to people’s problems,” says Vasu. In Mandya, the district where he is based, the Vedike is engaged in a battle for the rights of slum dwellers. Of the 18 slums in the town, the Vedike’s influence extends to 12 that have a population of over 10,000 people. The bargaining power that such a presence yields over the state administration is unprecedented.
In April 2009, exasperated by the state’s inaction in providing slum dwellers with housing, the Vedike took over government land and began construction work there.
‘IN TWO HOURS WE ERECTED TEMPORARY SHELTERS ON THE LAND EARMARKED FOR US,’ SAYS VASU
“In less than two hours we had erected temporary shelters on the land that was earmarked for us, despite an ongoing lawsuit. We wanted to tell the government that we were fed up of waiting for them,” explains Vasu. Despite heavy bandobast, the police did nothing to stop the activists – there were far too many to stop.
Vasu, who took to activism nine years ago after becoming involved in a campaign against the killer reproductive drug quincrinine, doesn’t mull too much on the difficulties of his chosen way of life. “There is a class bias to mapping sacrifice. Coming from a middle class background [Vasu is a doctor from a premier medical college in Bengaluru], I attract more sympathy as someone who has chosen this life. The same sympathy isn’t extended to an activist who has grown up in a slum. Life is hardly easier for him. He has sacrificed personal ambitions as much as I have,” he says with characteristic self-effacement.
SANJANA
The Farmer Of Freedom
LAHA GOPALAN, 58, has been leading adivasis and dalit agricultural labourers in Kerala to stake claim to land that is theirs
IMAGING: S K MOHAN/TEHELKA
AKERALa Electricity Board employee was transferred in 1990 to a remote corner of the state for leading a protest against its ‘100 Percent Literacy’ campaign, which had ignored key adivasi and dalit areas. Laha Gopalan had led 200 adivasis to protest their absence from the state’s agenda.
Sixteen years later, the recently retired Gopalan once again stepped up to confront the state about its neglect of dalits and adivasis and the “unconstitutional treatment of the country’s citizens”. His organisation, Sadhu Jana Samyukta Vimochana Vedi (SJSVV), spearheaded the encroachment of RPG subsidiary Harrison Malayalam’s Chengara rubber estate, where the lease had expired. Thousands of adivasi and dalit farm labourers set up camp in makeshift huts on the estate. Their key demand — that they be given the one to five acres of land that had been promised to each family by the AK Anthony-led Congress government. Historically, Kerala’s first Communist government’s land reforms had entitled tenants to 1/20th of an acre – barely enough space for a family to sleep in. The reforms, however, excluded cash crops, thus enabling companies like RPG and Tata to hold onto hundreds of acres while lower caste farm labourers continued to work on them.
GOPALAN HAS NINE POLICE CASES AGAINST HIM FOR CRIMES LIKE CUTTING A RUBBER TREE
Gopalan’s current role involves far greater risks than job transfers. In the years since the protestors forcibly occupied estate land, the 5,000 strong group has been at the receiving end of much violence. In a brazen incident, four young men were beaten by the estate’s goons. Then, the police charged two of them with theft and put them behind bars for 14 days without bail. Gopalan has nine police cases against him for crimes like cutting a rubber tree. All the cases were registered by estate ‘officials’. The one time he was arrested, protestors forced the police to release him within the hour. Ask him about personal losses and he says, “I’ve always been stubborn. There have been several incidents but they don’t count, considering how great the injustice being fought is”.
Gopalan has inspired a population to fight for what is theirs. “We don’t have a MLA, lawyer or anyone influential supporting us. Few in the movement have even passed class X. To raise consciousness among those who’ve been treated like slaves, is enough to consider the movement a success,” he says.
TEHELKA BUREAU
Vendor Of Tea And Truth
DAYAMANI BARLA, 44, is Jharkhand’s first adivasi journalist. She fights India’s largest steel plant with a mass movement and a tireless stride
IMAGING: RAJESH KUMAR SEN/TEHELKA
GROWING UP in the Arhara village in Jharkhand, Dayamani Barla, 44, could have been just one of the faceless thousands displaced by India’s largest steel plant. Today, she leads the mass movement against it. She could have been another adivasi with a crumbling house and a buried story. Instead, she became a storyteller, the “voice of Jharkhand,” the first tribal journalist from the state, the founder of Jan Hak Patrika. “We presented the point of view of adivasis, dalits, women,” she says. “They believed we’ll stand up for them.” A rural reporting award from P Sainath, and a Rs 25,000 bank loan sustained the paper for over two years. By then she’d convinced established local media like Prabhat Khabar to give space to adivasi and dalit issues.
“We’ll shoot so many bullets, people won’t recognise your dead body” – that was the threat Barla received in March 2008. “I don’t know whether the threat came from the company or the State,” she says, “since both work together.” By then, Barla had already been part of several local people’s movements — against dams on the Koel and Kari rivers, against delimitation that would reduce the number of seats for scheduled tribes, against corrupt NREGA dalals. The death threats would not deter her from the latest fight.
In 2005, Barla discovered maps in a Block Officer’s cabin marking 38 villages with one lakh families to be displaced by Arcelor Mittal’s 12 million tonne steel plant. It stirred her long journey across four districts of Jharkhand, through dense forests and rivers, alerting village after village to the impending doom. “Are you willing to give up your land?” Barla asked unaware villagers. Everyone said no. The mobilising began; she taught them the word ‘virodh’ and showed them how to.
Soon the local village meetings grew into the Adivasi Mulvasi Astitva Raksha Manch, uniting thousands of adivasis and farmers across Jharkhand. More than 15,000 of them followed Barla in street protests every week in March 2008. “Jaan denge, zamin nahin denge,” they chanted. A few months later, Arcelor Mittal told the Jharkhand government: “We can go ahead with the project whenever we like, but we’re not doing so because of the andolan.” Such victories gave the movement new impetus. The slogan changed: “Jaan bhi nahi denge, zamin bhi nahi denge.”
THROUGH FOUR DISTRICTS OF JHARKHAND, BARLA ALERTED VILLAGE AFTER VILLAGE TO THE IMPENDING DOOM
Barla’s own revolution began as a class III student in a local missionary school. The rice, dal and mustard fields her parents cultivated were snatched by “businessmen from another village”. Her parents had inked their thumbs onto paper that sold off their land. Within months, her family split. Her mother and brother moved to Ranchi to work as domestic help, her father left home to work as farm labour. She stayed in Arhara, worked from sunrise, separated chaff from wheat to “buy dinner and pencils.”
It is this early struggle that helped Barla see the “maha vinash” being unleashed in the name of development. “By uprooting our ancestral lands, they also tear apart our entire social fabric,” she says. “It destroys the language, traditions, culture, identity, financial structures of an entire community. It wipes out generations to come.”
SHE WASHED DISHES FOR THE POLICE, ATE THEIR LEFTOVERS AND STAYED WITH BUFFALOES WHILE FUNDING COLLEGE
In the years that followed, Barla moved to Ranchi, worked as domestic help, washed dishes for the police, ate their leftovers, stayed in a shed with buffaloes and coolies, earned her BCom degree, learnt to type in English and Hindi, worked as a typist for one rupee an hour and funded her MCom. By then it was 1997; she joined a local NGO as an office assistant. “There I saw the real face of NGOS. They collect money in the name of children and women, but don’t spend it on them.” Disillusioned with the idea of NGOS, she quit her job. Simultaneously, she learned that dams on the Koel and Kari rivers could submerge her village. She returned to Arhara, joined an already brewing people’s movement, and hasn’t looked back.
Today, Barla runs a teashop on Club road in Ranchi. Unknown figures have appeared on several occasions to attack it, but failed. “The masses are with us, they can’t touch me,” she says. When she’s away, her husband, previously a paan vendor, manages the shop alone. “The biggest challenge if you want to work for society,” she says, “is to find a way to get your daily meals.”
TUSHA MITTAL
The Grain Elevator
AKHIL GOGOI, 34, uses the Right to Information Act and non-violence to unearth corruption in Assam’s rural development schemes
IMAGING: UB PHOTOS/TEHELKA
SIMPLICITY IS difficult. Nobody knows that better than 34- year-old Akhil Gogoi, whose Krishak Mukti Sangram Samiti (KMSS) spearheads a landless peasants’ movement in Assam. The organisation has been waging war against corruption within Assam’s panchayat system, rural development schemes and the Public Distribution System (PDS).
Gogoi’s weapon is simple but potent. He uses non-violent agitation and now, the Right to Information Act, 2005. He used the RTI to decipher how about 95 percent of the rice intended to be sold under the PDS found its way to the black market. He has also revealed how corruption has crept into the Indira Awas Yojana and the Sampoorna Gramin Rozgar Yojana. All this involved a lot of research. Operating in three districts of the state, his group, the People’s Interest Research Group, carried out a comprehensive study on the PDS scheme. The study, which revealed major irregularities in the existing PDS, led to the dissolution of 11 cooperative societies and a government review of the distribution system.
The unmasking of the scam has made him many enemies. The PDS mafia and local politicians filed a case accusing him of militant leanings. For nearly two years, he remained underground. Even today, he cannot spend too much time with his three-year-old. “I’ve convinced my wife that I am wedded to the cause and she understands,” he says.
Gogoi eventually managed to get corrupt officials arrested. For this, he was honoured with the second Manjunath Shanmugam Integrity Award instituted in the memory of the Indian Oil manager killed by the petrol mafia in November 2005. “I believe awards make a person arrogant. But somehow, I could discover a bond in the honest cause of Manjunath,” he says. Among his early successes was the 2002 campaign to rehabilitate 5 lakh people from 42 villages being evicted from the forests of Golaghat. The movement forced the government to stop the eviction drive and provide a written assurance to settle the displaced forest dwellers. Inspired by that success, the KMSS was born on July 20, 2005. His latest struggle is for the full implementation of NREGA in Assam where there is no gram sabha or social audit and nobody seems to get 100 days wage. “There is no decentralisation of power. We are undertaking gherao programmes in every district. The community has to assert its rights over its resources,” he says.
TERESA REHMAN
PM’s address at the National Conference of Ministers of Environment & Forests
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12:0 IST
The Prime Minister, Dr. Manmohan Singh, addressed the National Conference of Ministers of Environment & Forests in New Delhi today. Speaking on the occasion, the Prime Minister asked the State Governments to create State level action plans on climate change consistent with the strategies in the National Plan. The Prime Minister emphasized the need for accessing the environment friendly technologies from the developed nations and also to make our own investments in such technologies.
Following is the text of the Prime Minister’s address on the occasion:
“I am happy to have this opportunity to address this very important National Conference of State Ministers of Environment and Forests. This is an area which is of great national importance and I am very happy that I have this opportunity to meet such distinguished group of representatives of our people debating an issue of critical importance to the future of our country.
The multiple environmental crises that confront our country have created in many ways an alarming situation. Climate change is threatening our fragile ecosystems. We are staring at the prospect of an impending drought. Water scarcity is becoming a way of life. Pollution is a growing threat to our health and to our habitats.
The agenda before you is, therefore, wide ranging and of great critical importance. I think the first task is to educate people not just on the impact of the crisis we face but also to encourage deeper reflection on what this obliges all of us to do. There are fundamental choices that we have to make about our lifestyles; about how we wish to produce and consume, the things we ought to do and the things we ought not to do. I sincerely believe that the greatest challenge facing humankind today is the challenge of arriving at a new equilibrium between man and nature.
The challenges we face are not insurmountable. We are blessed with nature’s bounty but as a people, we also have a deep cultural sensitivity to our environment. In fact, it was Smt. Indira Gandhi’s vision and love of nature that led to the setting up of a Ministry of Environment in the Government of India. She initiated Project Tiger in 1972 and was instrumental in the enactment of legislations such as the Wildlife Protection Act and the Forest Conservation Act. These monumental measures were ahead of their times. It is this far-sightedness, commitment and concern for our natural heritage that we need to invoke as we deal with the challenges that confront us now.
Climate change is today a major global challenge. The world is seriously concerned about it. So are we. There should be no doubt in anybody’s mind that we fully recognize not just how important this issue is to our country’s future but also our own obligation to address it. We are conscious of our responsibilities to both the present and the future generations and we seek to enhance the ecological sustainability of our development path.
I seek your cooperation in making a success of the eight National Missions and other initiatives that are the key components of our National Action Plan on climate change. I would urge each State Government to create their own State level action plans consistent with the strategies in the national plans. We need much broader consultation with the States on this issue and I sincerely hope that this would be an important theme of this Conference.
There is a pressing need to modernize the existing Forest and Wildlife management system in our country. It is apparent that we have to modernize our forest departments with improved resources, communication and improved training of our personnel. I am concerned that there are a large number of positions of front line personnel lying vacant in many states in the Forests and Wildlife sector. I urge the Hon’ble Ministers of the concerned States to redress this situation on a priority basis.
Another critical issue is the need to ensure that local communities benefit from conservation so that they can be increasingly involved in the efforts of conservation. Our tribals are our environmental foot soldiers. They have guarded our forests and evolved a sophisticated way of living in harmony with nature over the centuries. Their wisdom and their experience should be utilised to preserve our forests, to nurse them rather than making them orphans of the environment. The tribal rights act is an opportunity to guarantee the legitimate rights of forest dwellers and to bring them in the frontline of the environment movement for regeneration.
The Green India campaign is a major initiative that will have many spin-off benefits. We need to quickly operationalise the Compensatory Afforestation Management and Planning Authority (CAMPA) by constituting State level authorities. I am very happy that Jairam has brought a new sense of purpose and earnestness to this department and what he has told us about the transfer of funds from the CAMPA account to the States is the forerunner of things to come of greater collaboration, cooperation between the Centre and the States. So, I congratulate Jairam for this initiative.
Our country is blessed with mighty rivers that are inextricably linked with our history, our religious beliefs, our culture and our customs of our people. It is a matter of great concern therefore that we have not been able to reverse the degradation of this very important natural inheritance.
We have decided to adopt a different and more holistic approach taking the river and not the city as the unit of planning as we have done until now. The essence of this approach is not just to focus on river pollution but more comprehensively on catchment area treatment, protection of flood plains, ensuring ecological flows and restoration of the river ecosystem.
We have established the National Ganga River Basin Authority (NGRBA) as an empowered body under the Environment Protection Act, 1986. We hope that this model will be adopted for other major rivers in our country based on the experience we gain in its implementation. We have substantially increased the allocation for river conservation programme in this year’s budget, including a special provision of Rs.250 crores for the river Ganga.
It is vital that institutional structures are set up by all States for synergizing the river conservation efforts at the national and state levels. States should explore mobilizing additional resources for river cleaning through innovative models like Special Purpose Vehicles. I would also request State Governments to effectively enforce legal provisions through State Pollution Control Boards to curtail the discharge of untreated industrial effluents that account for nearly 25% of the total pollution load in our river systems.
We are all aware of the adverse impact climate change would have on our coastal areas. The Coastal Management Zone (CMZ) Notification issued in the year 2008 has been thoroughly reviewed by a committee headed by Prof. M.S. Swaminathan. I understand that this report has suggested an integrated approach in coastal area management for Andaman & Nicobar Islands and also for Lakshadweep Islands. I suggest that the Island authorities work in close coordination with the Centre to evolve an integrated approach.
I wish to draw your attention to the view that environmental clearances have become a new form of Licence Raj and a source of corruption. This is a matter that needs to be addressed head-on. There are trade-offs that have to be made while balancing developmental and environmental concerns. But the procedures must be fair, transparent and hassle free. Decisions must be taken within a specified time.
I am told that some times there are discrepancies in the Environmental Impact Assessment Reports. The September, 2006 Notification of the Ministry of Environment and Forests is a major attempt to rationalize the system of giving mandatory environmental clearance. I hope that we can improve the system further in the light of the experience gained. I would urge all the States who have not yet established State EIA Authorities to do so at the very earliest. Effective coordination between the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests and the State Ministry is vital if we are to build a credible and efficient system of assessment and clearance.
The recent introduction of the National Green Tribunal Bill in Parliament is a positive step forward. This will strengthen environmental adjudication and settlement of disputes. We should consider setting up a National Environment Protection Authority supported by regional Environment Protection Authorities.
In dealing with the challenge of climate change and environmental degradation we face the unfair burden of past mistakes not of our making. But, as we go forward in the march of development we have the opportunity not to repeat those past mistakes. Our growth strategy can be and should be innovative and different. It must be different. We are still at early stages of industrialization and urbanization. Our energy needs will increase sharply in the decades to come. We can and we must walk a different road, an environment friendly road.
For this we need access to new technologies that are already available with the developed countries. We must also make our own investments in new environment-friendly technologies. We need to strengthen the scientific foundations of our environment policies and strengthen our capacity to deal with the challenges that lie ahead. We must involve more stakeholders particularly our youth to lead the movement for environmental protection and regeneration.
I urge all of you to use your collective knowledge and wisdom and experience to seek new pathways to reverse the environmental degradation and resource depletion that threatens our economic security and well being. With these words, I wish your Conference all success. I thank you.”
Conference of Chief Ministers of Naxal-affected States held
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16:19 IST
A meeting of Chief Ministers of some Naxal-affected States was held here yesterday. It was chaired by the Union Home Minister, Shri P.Chidambaram.
In his remarks at the meeting, the Union Home Minister said that Naxalism poses a serious threat not only to national security, but also to development in the affected areas as Naxalites have been targeting vital infrastructure including roads, bridges, railways, school buildings and communications and power networks. He said that the menace has to be tackled resolutely and without losing any time. Shri Chidambaram called upon the States to strengthen rural policing by filling up vacancies and fortifying police stations. Pointing out the importance of intelligence collection at the local level, he urged the States to strengthen their intelligence set-up. He expressed concern over under-utilization of the amounts made available to some States under the Scheme for Security Related Expenditure, Special Infrastructure Scheme, and Scheme for Modernization of State Police Forces. The Union Home Minister called upon the States to frame an attractive surrender and rehabilitation policy, put in place an effective machinery for grievance redressal and take steps to stop the flow of funds and supply of arms and ammunition to Naxals.
Taking part in the deliberations, the Chief Ministers gave an account of the steps taken by them for fighting the Naxal menace. They sought increased central assistance for training their forces in counter-insurgency operations and for constructing roads of critical importance. There was a consensus at the meeting on the strategy that needs to be adopted for fighting Naxalism.
Steel Minister asks SAIL to complete all ongoing expansion plans on time
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16:6 IST
The Minister for Steel Shri Virbhadra Singh has asked the Steel Authority of India to complete all the ongoing expansion programmes on time. The minister was reviewing the Q1 performance of the public sector major at a meeting here today. The Minister said, the economy looks set for a rebound considering the latest IIP numbers and the projections of GDP this fiscal. He said, this will translate into decent demand growth for steel in the near future. The Minister appreciated the difficult business environment following the slowdown and hoped the situation to improve in the next couple of quarters. The Minister expressed satisfaction over the performance of SAIL during the first quarter.
The steel major reported a turnover of Rs 9747 Crore during April – June 09, a decrease of 20 per cent over the same quarter last year. The net profit also fell by 27.7 per cent to Rs.1326 crore. The profitability was adversely affected due to reduction in average net sales realization of saleable steel, escalation in input prices mainly of imported coal, coke, ferro-silicon, increase in railway freight, increase in fuel cost surcharge by DVC and higher interest charges. Making a presentation the SAIL Chairman Shri S.K.Roongta said, the adverse effect was partially offset by higher saleable steel production(4.0%) and sales volume (4.4%), improved production of value added products(21%), reduction in coke rate and specific energy consumption, improvement in Blast Furnace productivity, write back of provisions for salaries and wages revision of employees and higher interest earnings. Shri Roongta said, most of the ongoing expansion plans are on schedule.
The Minister urged SAIL to strengthen its CSR activities. He said, out of the budget of Rs. 80 Crore, the company has been able to spend Rs10.83Crore during the first quarter which is a drop of 201 per cent on sequential basis and a drop of 60 per cent compared to Q1 of the previous year.
Steel Secretary Shri P.K.Rastogi and other senior officers attended today’s review.
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Government to improve investment climate for mining sector : Handique
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16:3 IST
The Minister of Mines and Minister of Development of North Eastern Region, Shri B.K. Handique has said that efforts would be made to improve the investment climate for mining in the country. He said this while delivering the inaugural address at the 43rd Annual General Meeting of Federation of Indian Minerals Industries (FIMI) here today.
Speaking on the occasion, he said, “we are conscious that policy initiatives and legislative measures need to be evolved constantly with the changing needs”. Shri Handique said that sustainable development of our mineral industry, with a view to achieve desired growth rate lies at the very core of our efforts. Indeed, it is our common goal and we are all working towards its fulfillment, he added.
Shri Handique said that the 100 days Agenda include framing of new legislation to give effect to the National Mineral Policy 2008 on the aspects relating to transparency and seamlessness in the concession regime, sustainable development framework etc. The draft legislation is being finalized and will be brought before Parliament in the ensuing Winter Session.
The Minister also gave away Environment, Social Awareness and Excellence awards for the year 2008-09.
DDRS provides assistance to Mentally Retarded Children
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16:1 IST
In 2008-09, 238 NGOs working in the field of rehabilitation of Mentally Retarded Children were provided financial assistance under the Deendayal Disabled Rehabilitation Scheme (DDRS). The country has 7.96 lakh persons with mental disability in the age group of 0 to 19 years, as per Census 2001. There is, however, no centralized data-base of Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) who are working in this field to provide succor to these children.
Under the Deendayal Disabled Rehabilitation Scheme (DDRS), the Government provides funds to NGOs for running projects for the rehabilitation of persons with disabilities, which includes mentally retarded children. Some of the important eligibility criteria for selection of NGOs under the Scheme are as below:
(i) The organization should be registered under the Societies Registration Act, 1860 (XXI of 1860) or any relevant Act of the State/Union Territory; or a public trust registered under the law for the time being in force; or a charitable company licensed under Section 25 of the Companies Act, 1958;
(ii) The organization should be registered under the Persons with Disabilities (Equal Opportunities, Protection of Rights and Full Participation) Act, 1995;
(iii) The organization should have a legally constituted managing body;
(iv) It should not be running for profit to any individual or body of individuals;
(v) It should have at least 2 years experience in running the project for which the grant-in-aid has been applied;
(vi) It should have engaged qualified staff as prescribed under the Schemes.
The NGOs are provided grant-in-aid on the basis of the recommendations of the concerned State Governments/Union Territory Administrations.
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Advance planning must for achieving Power Sector targets: Sushilkumar Shinde
INTERNATIONAL CONCLAVE ON “KEY INPUTS FOR ACCELERATED DEVELOPMENT OF INDIAN POWER SECTOR FOR 12TH PLAN & BEYOND” BEGINS IN NEW DELHI
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15:57 IST
Setting the tone for deliberations at the International Conclave on “key inputs for accelerated development of Indian power sector for 12th plan & beyond” which began in New Delhi today, Union Power Minister Shri SushilKumar Shinde called upon all stakeholders in Power Sector to plan in advance so that targets could be achieved well in time. Delivering the inaugural address, the Minister observed that advance planning is required due to long gestation period of the power projects. He said that lack of adequate planning had been the main cause of failure in achieving power sector targets set for the 8th, 9th and 10th plan periods. He said that more than 16000 MW capacity has already been added in the 11th plan and the rest of the targeted capacity is under various stages of construction. Appreciating the initiative of the Central Electricity Authority, CEA in preparing base paper for industry and utilities to asses their preparedness to meet future requirements, particularly in the 12th plan and beyond, Shri Shinde expressed hope that such efforts will ensure that the power sector targets are achieved without much hindrances. Expressing confidence in the power sector’s capabilities to achieve future targets, the Minister pointed out that there is a positive environment for the growth of the sector in the country. He said that while his Ministry planned for only 9 Ultra Mega Power Projects in 2007, 13 of them are being considered today.
Addressing the gathering, Deputy Chairman, Planning Commission, Dr. Montek Singh Ahluwalia stressed the need for concentrating on generation from renewables since the country has a large potential in the area.
The main objective of the Conclave organized by Ministry of Power and CEA is to sensitize the industry and the utilities about the capacity addition and transmission/distribution expansion programme during the 12th Plan and beyond and to discuss their preparedness with respect to meeting the requirements of the power sector. During the Conclave Issues and Constraints being experienced by the project developers and the industry will be discussed and a road map for overcoming the bottlenecks in implementation of the capacity addition plan as also the corresponding transmission and distribution programmes would be drawn. CEA has prepared a base paper on key inputs for accelerated development of power sector for 12th Plan & beyond and a booklet indicating requirement of various equipments and materials for 12th Plan generation, transmission and distribution projects to enable industry to do advanced preparations.
Speaking on the occasion, the Guest of Honour, Shri Bharat Sinh Solanki, Minister of State for Power, said that the major challenge before the Power Sector revolves around providing competitive power to industries and to all households while improving the reliability and quality of supply. Stressing the need to join hands and strive forward together to meet this challenge he said it is essential to exploit a balanced mix of all available energy resources governed by the principles of sustainable development, keeping in view the energy security of the country. The Minister also observed that due to the efforts of the Ministry of Power, orders were placed for about 51,000 MW during the last 2 years and nearly 80,610 MW is being monitored for implementation during the 11th Plan.
Earlier, Shri HS Brahma, Secretary, Ministry of Power, stressed the need for team efforts to achieve future targets. The Conclave, he observed, aims to build that team spirit among all the stake holders.
The two day event is widely attended by equipment manufacturers, contractors, private entrepreneurs, Power Utilities, financial institutions, consultants and training institutes. The industry partners of the Conclave are CII and IEEMA.
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New model schemes from NREGS to benefit citizens
TNN 17 August 2009, 10:43pm IST
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MANGALORE: The chief executive officer of Dakshina Kannada Zilla Panchayat P Shivashankar has instructed the departments of watershed,
horticulture, social forestry and education to come up with new model of schemes in coordination with each other, for effective implementation of National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS) in the district.
Speaking at the monthly meeting of Karnataka Development Programmes (KDP) here on Tuesday, the CEO said watershed department should make use of the local human resources under the Suvarna Krishi Honda (farm ponds) scheme and the education department while constructing buildings under Sarva Shikshana Abhiyana.
"The scheme to provide electricity connection to the beneficiaries under Ganga Kalyana Yojane of 2007-08 must be completed by August. The solution to the problem of registration and others for 2008-09 must be solved by September", he added.
"The target for minor irrigation department for 2009-10 is to irrigate 309.37 hectare of land. It has been decided to construct seven check dams. Five check dams have already been completed. Irrigation facilities have been provided to 274.5 hectare land", the officials informed.
Education and health standing committee president Rajashri Hegde expressed displeasure over selecting Puttur and Mangalore taluk for the project.
Officials of the department of food and civil supplies informed that BPL card is being distributed in Mangalore taluk from Tuesday onwards.
Shivashankar also directed the officials to take a decision at the taluk KDP meetings on the need to provide electricity to the beneficiaries under Bhagya Jyothi, Kuteera Jyothi schemes and send it to Zilla Panchayat. He directed the officials to identify 33% women and 3% disabled while selecting beneficiaries for the total sanitation campaign.
Agriculture department joint director Padmaiah Naik said the department has released 900 tones of Suphala fertilizer to the district. Awareness is being created among farmers on complex fertilizers and organic manure, he said.
Raise wages under NREGS to Rs 200 per day: Brinda asks Centre
Published: August 17,2009
Bidar , Aug 17 CPI(M) Politburo member Brinda Karat today demanded that the Centre raise the wages under National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme from Rs 100 per day to Rs 200 in view of drought like situations in many parts of the country.
Addressing a rally here, she also sought payment of wages immediately after the beneficiaries undertook work.
Karat criticised what she described as the"lethargic attitude"of the UPA Government in tackling the situation.
She demanded that the Centre take immediate steps to address basic needs like ration supply, employment generation and relief measures in drought-hit areas.
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