Skip to main content

Govt of India "bent on selling off" coast to corporates, "eliminate" fishing communities

By A Representative
The National Fishworkers Forum (NFF), apex body of fisherfolks' organizations, has said that the Government of India, by giving the cabinet approval to the Coastal Regulation Zone (CRZ) Notification 2018, has turned a deaf ear to the protests and objections raised by the thousands of fishing communities, concerned organisations and individuals from all around the coast and the country.
"The sole purpose of the Government of India in drafting and approving the CRZ 2018 Notification has been to pave way to further sell off our coastal land and water to corporate and business houses by removing restrictions on constructions and activities detrimental to coastal natural resources", it said.
Signed by Narendra R Patil, chairperson, and T Peter, general secretary, NFF statement said, "The CRZ 2011 process guaranteed not only environmental protection and livelihood security, but also was a reminder of the robust democratic processes and engagements it followed in its implementation", though regretting, "The implementation of the CRZ 2011 remains far from satisfactory."
However, it believed, "While the failure to implement the CRZ 2011 rests squarely with the Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change and the State Governments, the relevance of CRZ 2011 is still high. The Cabinet turned a blind eye to this, went ahead and approved the Coastal Regulation Zone Notification 2018."

Comments

TRENDING

Gujarat Sachivalaya blacklists, denies entry to woman social activist: Will NHRC probe?

By Kantilal Parmar*  I have approached the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) seeking an independent, impartial, and transparent investigation into a serious incident that took place at the Gujarat Secretariat in Gandhinagar on August 18, 2026. The matter concerns social activist and women’s rights leader Chandrikaben Solanki, who, according to the information available to me, was denied an entry pass to the Secretariat when she went there to meet Gujarat’s Social Justice and Empowerment Minister, Dr. Manishaben Vakil, to raise an issue concerning social justice.

Ample evidence of child labour in South Gujarat's cash rich sugarcane belt: Study

By Rajiv Shah A recent German government-funded study , undertaken jointly by the NGO Prayas Centre for Labour Research and Action and the Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung, which mainly deals examines the working conditions of migrant workers in the cash-rich sugarcane zone of South Gujarat, has gone a long way to suggest large scale prevalence of child labour during the harvesting season.

Right to walk, right to livelihood: Clearing footpaths 'can't mean' clearing out the urban poor

By Aseem Mishra*    India’s cities are locked in a quiet but intensifying struggle over one of their most contested public spaces: the footpath. For pedestrians, a footpath is basic infrastructure—a strip of ground that should allow people to move safely, independently and with dignity. For millions of informal workers, the same stretch of pavement is a workplace, a source of daily income and often the difference between survival and destitution.