The Hindu : Karnataka / Bangalore News : NURM termed a ploy to displace poor

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Jun 01, 2006

Karnataka

Karnataka - Bangalore

NURM termed a ploy to displace poor

Staff Reporter

Medha opposes privatisation of water

Bangalore: The National Alliance of Peoples Movements (NAPM) was looking at strategies to oppose the privatisation of basic necessities such as water and land, Narmada Bachao Andolan leader Medha Patkar said here on Wednesday.

Ms. Patkar told presspersons that displacement was one of the main issues that the NAPM was campaigning against but the movement was opposed to the commodification of water in the form of bottling and the interlinking of rivers in Bihar.

She said that the movement opposed the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (NURM), which was not aimed at urban development or renewal but was mostly a ploy to remove the urban poor from the cities. Aruna Roy of NAPM said the movement was asking for the democratic right of the marginalised sections in the country on basic needs — right to water, land, and information. "We have come together to chalk out a plan of action for the next three years so that we can strategise on combating anti-people development policies," she said.

Shaktiman Ghosh of the National Hawkers Federation said the National Urban Renewal Mission was a ploy by the Government to displace the urban poor and bring in a system in the cities, which was favourable only to the rich.

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