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Peaceful Demonstrators Against the Narmada Dam Project Arrested, Beaten, and Intimidated by Police
Take Action against the Narmada Dam The Narmada Valley Development Project, the single largest river development scheme in India and one of the largest hydroelectric projects in the world, will displace an estimated 1.5 million people from their land in three states (Gujarat, Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh). The environmental costs of such a project, which involves the construction of more than 3,000 large and small dams, are immense. The project will inundate thousands of acres of forests and agricultural land, a devastating blow to human lives and biodiversity. Over the past decade the Indian police have allegedly committed serious human rights violations against villagers and others protesting against the construction of this and other dams. Use of preventive arrest, detention, excessive use of force during arrest, physical abuse, and threats are just some of the documented violations. Medha Patkar and hundreds of other villagers stand inside small thatched roof houses as the waters of the Narmada River continue to rise. Each monsoon season thousands of people are told by the Indian government that they will have to be relocated as their ancestral lands are flooded out. Most of them, led by Patkar, have decided to resist evacuation in protest of the Narmada Valley Development Project. Since 1985, a people’s organization that opposes the project, the Narmada Bachao Andolan (Save the Narmada Movement, or NBA) has been organizing massive rallies and peaceful demonstrations to protest the destruction of the Narmada valley. Despite the non-violent nature of the protests, NBA activists have been arrested and beaten on countless occasions. Activist Medha Patkar, a key organizing figure of the NBA and other members of the organization have been subjected to intimidation for several years. The NBA offices have been ransacked and several of its members have been arrested during rallies and demonstrations. On September 23, 1999, Patkar and over 350 others were arrested and reportedly beaten by police as they peacefully protested against submergence of hundreds of villages during the monsoon. They were detained in jail for 13 days before being released by the courts. The largest of the dams is the Sardar Sarovar which, when completed, will flood more than 370 square kilometers (142 square miles) of forest and agricultural land, displacing more than half a million people and destroying some of India’s most fertile land. The government claims that the dam would provide water to 40 million people, irrigate 1.8 million hectares, and generate about 1450 megawatts of power, but the NBA and other organizations believe these claims are greatly exaggerated. Instead they argue, because of the sheer size of the project, the Sardar Sarovar dam could bring about some of the worst environmental destruction in India. If completed, several hundred square miles of forest would disappear, destroying precious habitat for tigers, panthers, sloth bear, barking deer, several rare tree species, and hundred of plants with medicinal potential. Local and tribal people benefit from the forest by harvesting fruits and nuts, which provide an important supplement to their diet. The World Bank had originally supported the Sardar Sarovar project with a $450-million loan. However, pressure from Indian and international environmental organizations forced the World Bank to appoint an independent panel to review the impacts of the project. The Independent Review determined that the environmental and social impacts of the project had not been properly considered and advised the Bank to step back from the Project. The Bank withdrew its support in 1993. Damming the Narmada River is likely to degrade the fertile agricultural soils due to continuous irrigation (rather the seasonal irrigation which is dependent on the monsoon), and salinization, making the soil toxic to many plant species. To further compound the problem, the impact of moving hundreds of thousands of people to other lands will also have a serious effect on the ecology of the area of relocation, creating a serious environmental dilemma. As the silt accumulates behind the massive walls of the dam, fish populations are likely to decline, affecting the more than 10,000 families that depend on them for food. Threatened with the submergence of their villages, their land, and their forests, thousands of valley residents began to protest against the construction of the Sardar Sarovar and other large dams. The Indian police have often responded to these protests with violence and intimidation. This has resulted in a long history of human rights violations, some of which have been documented by Amnesty International. In 1992, forest guards and police fired upon and killed several villagers who were cultivating the land in the dam project area. More recently, in April 1998, Amnesty International expressed concern that peaceful protesters, who were attempting to stop construction of a dam at the Maheshwar project site in Madhay Pradesh, were arrested and mistreated by police under a section of the civil code preventing unlawful assembly Women have been especially targeted for their leadership. In response to allegations of excessive force against women protesters on April 22 and 23, 1998 at the Maheshwar project site, a team from the National Commission for Women, which visited the area, found evidence of "extensive" use of violence against peaceful protesters. The Commission recommended that "the state government should ensure that the presence of police at the dam site is there to protect people. The police should be prevented from becoming a private army working against people." Take Action Call on the Indian government and the three state governments of Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra to protect the human rights of protesting villagers and activists and uphold constitutional guarantees for freedom of association and speech. Government authorities must respect the right to freedom of expression and association of those affected and the dam construction workers, and ensure that their civil and political rights are not violated and they are not detained and subjected to cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment. Write to the Indian Ambassador: Ambassador Naresh ChandraEmbassy of India 2107 Massachusetts Avenue, NW Washington, DC 20008 PHONE: 202-939-7000 FAX: 202-483-3972 Write to the Governors of the three Indian states involved in the Narmada project: Mr Keshubai Patel Mr. Vilasrao Deshmukh Mr. Vijvijay Sinjh More Information
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