Medha Patkar calls for 'people's struggle'

By Our Staff Correspondent

BHOPAL, JUNE 13. The Narmada Bachao Andolan (NBA) leader, Ms. Medha Patkar, along with activists and villagers affected by the Sardar Sarovar and other dams being constructed on the Narmada has called for a people's struggle against ``the most illegal, inhuman and fatal submergence being imposed on the Narmada Valley during this monsoon.''

In a statement, Ms. Patkar and other activists contend that the construction of up to 93 metres (with humps) on the Sardar Sarovar Project (SSP) would destroy the homes, farms, and natural resources of 5000 tribal families in the villages of Gujarat, Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh. Depending on the rainfall, the SSP construction may wipe out the tribal belt in the affected zone in the Narmada Valley. This time the submergence would extend up to the fertile plains of Nimad in Madhya Pradesh.

The NBA activists say it is in the national interest to stop the work on the dam and review all its aspects. The Government has imposed submergence and displacement by raising the height of the dam with `fraudulent means' and `bypassing' the decision of the Rehabilitation and Environment sub-groups of the Narmada Control Authority (NCA) thereby violating the Supreme Court verdict itself. All the basic issues like the cost-benefit and displacement-resettlement, and environmental aspects have remained unaddressed and the people are refusing to leave their villages. Questioning the role of the Supreme Court in this regard, the NBA activists say that it has taken away all the legal and constitutional protection for the tribals and peasants, thereby allowing the Government to suppress the rights of the people.

They say the same is the case with all completed and ongoing projects in the Narmada Valley like Bargi, Narmada Sagar, Maheshwar and Maan in Madhya Pradesh.

However, the State Government is destroying the Adivasis-peasants and their organisation for the sake of corporate interests. It is the flawed water policy, centralised management of natural resources and globalised economy that is to be challenged and the decentralised, employment-generating economic policies that need to be supported, the NBA says.

The Narmada activists have announced that in the next phase of their struggle non-violent resistance will be launched from July 5 at Jalsindhi in Madhya Pradesh and Domkhedi in Maharashtra. The satyagraha will start from Chhoti Kasravad near Baba Amte's residence on July 9. At both places people will stay in their homes and face the rising waters.

From July 10 to 12, senior social activists and prominent people from different parts of the country would be holding a protest and solidarity fast in Kasravad.

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