The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh News : Aluminium plant: villagers left in the lurch

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Thursday, May 29, 2008
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Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh

Aluminium plant: villagers left in the lurch

G. Narasimha Rao

Many who depend on ryots do not figure in the package

Public hearing by State Pollution Control Board to be held at Rachapalli on June 7
Farmers said to be receiving indirect threat to sell their lands

KOTHAPALEM (Visakhapatnam dist.): The Government-supported efforts to make the farmers agree to part with their lands for construction of the Anrak Alumina Limited’s alumina refinery and aluminium plant in Makavarapalem mandal in Visakhapatnam district are going on without getting much public attention in the backdrop of allegations that leaders of both Congress and Telugu Desam are helping the cause.

In this background, the mandatory public hearing on the plant to be conducted by the AP State Pollution Control Board at Rachapalli on June 7 is the last chance for the many organisations, political parties and others opposing the complex and to highlight the protest of farmers and the massive damage environment would suffer due to the plant.

A visit to the area where the refinery is being proposed revealed that most of the farmers had to part due to the indirect threat from officials that the lands would be taken over whether they were willing or not after depositing money in their names in the banks at Rs.4 lakhs an acre, the price fixed for the land.

The farmers might get the compensation and also land for houses and cattle sheds but agricultural labourers, carpenters, barbers, and other sections of people that depend on the farmers have been completely ignored.

There is no mention of them in the package. They do not own any piece of land and hence are out of purview of the compensation package.

It is also disturbing to note that the farmers who will get compensation will be hardly left with any money once they clear the loans. Buying land at other places is just unthinkable, as the land prices have hit the sky.

A carpenter Kommoju Somaraju of Ramannapalem and members of six other families of his caste have been busy preparing or repairing agricultural implements and have been able to pull on without much difficulty with what the villager farmers were paying them.

But for the last one year or so, Somaraju and others have not touched their tools thanks to the farmers handing over their lands to the Government.

Migration

Buddida Nageswara Rao is one of the weavers of the village. Ten weaver families have migrated to other places and another 10 are still in the village. Nageswara Rao is doing manual labour to eke out a living and is not sure the same will be available once the village is vacated. A barber Rajana Appa Rao is also forced to look for manual labour work and is mentally prepared to migrate to another place. “We have no place here,” he decided.

Puliga Kondayya belongs to Telakala community which prepares and sells oil are forced to keep their mills (Ganuga) idle as there is no raw material available.

They are all upset that the 56-day dharna against the alumina refinery failed to solve their problem and Government had its way and did not bother about them.

The CPI (M) which is agitating against the refinery and the bauxite mining in the agency area has taken up the cause of the carpenters and others and is conducting an awareness programme, said its district secretary Ch. Narasinga Rao. The public hearing must be utilised by the people to express their opposition to the refinery, he and other leaders said.

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