Andhra project to "submerge" 11,200 acres of revenue, 6,600 acres of forest land; 70,000 to lose livelihood: Report

Senior activist Vimala Morthala interacting
with tribal villagers

By A Representative
A fact-finding committee has estimated that 11,200 acres of revenue land of 127 villages, apart from 6,600 acres of forest land, would be submerged in Andhra Pradesh as a result of the proposed Rs 4,910 crore Chintalapudi Lift Irrigation project. Also displacing 16 adivasi villages, the team has further estimated that 70,000 people would lose their livelihood “entirely or partially”.
An initial report prepared by the civil society team of the National Alliance of People’s Movements (NAPM) and other people’s organizations, which visited the project-affected villages of three mandals, Jeelugumilli, T Narsapuram and Chintalapudi of West Godavari district, said its main purpose was to "understand the problems being faced by the people” because of the project.
Those who would lose their land are “land-owning farmers, landless labourers, tenant farmers and people engaged in other rural occupations”, the report said, adding, “In addition to the problems being faced by the people due to the large-scale displacement, there are also severe environmental impacts generated by this project. ”
The team – which particularly "assessed" the implementation of the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement (LARR) Act, 2013 – alarmingly found that before putting the project in motion no social impact assessment (SIA) of the area was carried out. SIA is one of the major provisions of the LARR Act.

A displaced farmer

Pointing out that the “the government is proceeding without an authenticated documentation of all the families being impacted by the project and the nature of impact”, the report also stated that no public hearing was conducted on the project, nor was any gram sabha meetings called, or local bodies such as panchayats consulted in any of the affected villages.
Pointing out that “the objections and opinions expressed by the affected villagers have not been considered or responded to”, the report said, the government is going ahead with the project without any environmental Clearance for the project.
In yet another observation, the report said, “The Rehabilitation and Resettlement Plan, as per the requirements of the LARR Act, has not been published and made public for any village”, adding, even “the claims of adivasis to their cultivation rights over forest lands, under the Forest Rights Act (FRA), 2006 have not been settled”, yet the government “is proceeding with acquiring forest lands.”
Pointing towards further violations of the LARR Act, the report said, “The real market value of land is not being determined as per the letter and spirit of Section 26(B) of the Act, when the compensation rates are being fixed.”
It added, many land holders are being offered “ex-gratia payment” in violation of the the land-for-land provision of the Act for irrigation projects.
The report said, “Since the Chintalapudi project is part of the larger Polavaram project which is being implemented through the Central government funds, the rules declared for Central government projects for rehabilitation and resettlement should be implemented.”
Wanting LARR Act to be implemented in letter and spirit, the report said, referring in particular to the provision that the compensation for the land to be submerged should be four times the market value.
The Chintalapudi Lift Irrigation project was initiated in 2008 with a capacity of 8 thousand million cubic feet (tmcft), was recently expanded to 20 tmcft.
The fact-finding committee included Meera Sanghamitra, a national convener of NAPM; Mortala Vimala, social activist; Babuji from Andhra Pradesh Vyavasaya Vruttidarula Union (APVVU); and Rahul Maganti, an independent journalist.

Comments

Urgent need to study cause of large number of natural deaths in Gulf countries

By Venkatesh Nayak* According to data tabled in Parliament in April 2018, there are 87.76 lakh (8.77 million) Indians in six Gulf countries, namely Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). While replying to an Unstarred Question (#6091) raised in the Lok Sabha, the Union Minister of State for External Affairs said, during the first half of this financial year alone (between April-September 2018), blue-collared Indian workers in these countries had remitted USD 33.47 Billion back home. Not much is known about the human cost of such earnings which swell up the country’s forex reserves quietly. My recent RTI intervention and research of proceedings in Parliament has revealed that between 2012 and mid-2018 more than 24,570 Indian Workers died in these Gulf countries. This works out to an average of more than 10 deaths per day. For every US$ 1 Billion they remitted to India during the same period there were at least 117 deaths of Indian Workers in Gulf ...

A comrade in culture and controversy: Yao Wenyuan’s revolutionary legacy

By Harsh Thakor* This year marks two important anniversaries in Chinese revolutionary history—the 20th death anniversary of Yao Wenyuan, and the 50th anniversary of his seminal essay "On the Social Basis of the Lin Biao Anti-Party Clique". These milestones invite reflection on the man whose pen ignited the first sparks of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution and whose sharp ideological interventions left an indelible imprint on the political and cultural landscape of socialist China.

India's health workers have no legal right for their protection, regrets NGO network

Counterview Desk In a letter to Union labour and employment minister Santosh Gangwar, the civil rights group Occupational and Environmental Health Network of India (OEHNI), writing against the backdrop of strike by Bhabha hospital heath care workers, has insisted that they should be given “clear legal right for their protection”.

Uttarakhand tunnel disaster: 'Question mark' on rescue plan, appraisal, construction

By Bhim Singh Rawat* As many as 40 workers were trapped inside Barkot-Silkyara tunnel in Uttarkashi after a portion of the 4.5 km long, supposedly completed portion of the tunnel, collapsed early morning on Sunday, Nov 12, 2023. The incident has once again raised several questions over negligence in planning, appraisal and construction, absence of emergency rescue plan, violations of labour laws and environmental norms resulting in this avoidable accident.

History, culture and literature of Fatehpur, UP, from where Maulana Hasrat Mohani hailed

By Vidya Bhushan Rawat* Maulana Hasrat Mohani was a member of the Constituent Assembly and an extremely important leader of our freedom movement. Born in Unnao district of Uttar Pradesh, Hasrat Mohani's relationship with nearby district of Fatehpur is interesting and not explored much by biographers and historians. Dr Mohammad Ismail Azad Fatehpuri has written a book on Maulana Hasrat Mohani and Fatehpur. The book is in Urdu. He has just come out with another important book, 'Hindi kee Pratham Rachna: Chandayan' authored by Mulla Daud Dalmai.' During my recent visit to Fatehpur town, I had an opportunity to meet Dr Mohammad Ismail Azad Fatehpuri and recorded a conversation with him on issues of history, culture and literature of Fatehpur. Sharing this conversation here with you. Kindly click this link. --- *Human rights defender. Facebook https://www.facebook.com/vbrawat , X @freetohumanity, Skype @vbrawat

Job opportunities decreasing, wages remain low: Delhi construction workers' plight

By Bharat Dogra* It was about 32 years back that a hut colony in posh Prashant Vihar area of Delhi was demolished. It was after a great struggle that the people evicted from here could get alternative plots that were not too far away from their earlier colony. Nirmana, an organization of construction workers, played an important role in helping the evicted people to get this alternative land. At that time it was a big relief to get this alternative land, even though the plots given to them were very small ones of 10X8 feet size. The people worked hard to construct new houses, often constructing two floors so that the family could be accommodated in the small plots. However a recent visit revealed that people are rather disheartened now by a number of adverse factors. They have not been given the proper allotment papers yet. There is still no sewer system here. They have to use public toilets constructed some distance away which can sometimes be quite messy. There is still no...

Women's rights leaders told to negotiate with Muslimness, as India's donor agencies shun the word Muslim

By A Representative Former vice-president Hamid Ansari has sharply criticized donor agencies engaged in nongovernmental development work, saying that they seek to "help out" marginalizes communities with their funds, but shy away from naming Muslims as the target group, something, he insisted, needs to change. Speaking at a book release function in Delhi, he said, since large sections of Muslims are poor, they need political as also social outreach.

Warning bells for India: Tribal exploitation by powerful corporate interests may turn into international issue

By Ashok Shrimali* Warning bells are ringing for India. Even as news drops in from Odisha that Adivasi villages, one after another, are rejecting the top UK-based MNC Vedanta's plea for mining, a recent move by two senior scholars Felix Padel and Samarendra Das suggests the way tribals are being exploited in India by powerful international and national business interests may become an international issue. In fact, one has only to count days when things may be taken up at the United Nations level, with India being pushed to the corner. Padel, it may be recalled, is a major British authority on indigenous peoples across the world, with several scholarly books to his credit.

Gujarat Bitcoin scam worth Rs 5,000 crore "linked" with BJP leaders: Need for Supreme Court monitored probe

By Shaktisinh Gohil* BJP hit a jackpot in the form of demonetisation, which it used as an alibi to convert black money into white in Gujarat. Even as party scrambles for answers of how the Ahmedabad District Cooperative Bank (ADCB), whose director is BJP president Amit Shah, received old currency worth Rs 745.58 crore in just five days, and how Rs 3118.51 crore was deposited in 11 district cooperative banks linked with Gujarat BJP leaders, a new mega Bitcoin scam, worth more than Rs 5,000 crore has been unraveled.

Counterview

Search This Blog