Fwd: {Youth for Social Change} Indians Conclude 200-Mile Protest - 'Zameen do ya jail do' abhiyan
Abhijit K
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From: Somu Kumar <somu...@gmail.com>
Date: Oct 30, 2007 4:17 AM
Subject: {Youth for Social Change} Indians Conclude 200-Mile Protest - 'Zameen do ya jail do' abhiyan
To: aid-...@yahoogroups.com, aims...@yahoogroups.com, bm_...@yahoogroups.com, youthforso...@googlegroups.com, Makkal-Sakt...@yahoogroups.com, sda...@yahoogroups.com
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/29/world/asia/28cnd-india.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin
Also: 'Zameen do ya jail do'' - http://www.rediff.com/news/2007/oct/29spec.htm
Indians Conclude 200-Mile Protest
NEW DELHI, Oct. 28 — From a village in Madhya Pradesh State, in the heart of India, Gudiya Bai came here walking because, she said, she lost her land to a limestone mine. From eastern Orissa, Johny Bilyung came because most of his tiny plot was taken over for the construction of a dam. And from neighboring Jharkhand, Budhua Tanabhagat came because he has yet to get water from a dam that cost him half of his fields.
For 26 days, thousands of peasants like these have marched more than 200 miles to the capital with the hope of telling their government how they had been cast aside by this country's roaring economic growth. They reached here this morning in an orderly, peaceful three mile-long procession. Most of them wore plastic flip-flops, and some said they were already on their third pair.
A spokesman for Ekta Parishad, or Unity Council, which organized the march, estimated a turnout of 25,000, which could not be independently verified.
Their principal grievance was over land, and their presence in the capital was a stark reminder of one of the biggest challenges facing India, as it seeks to balance the needs of a vulnerable countryside and the demands of economic expansion.
More than half of the population makes its living off agriculture, and most Indian peasants subsist on tiny plots fed by fickle rains. While industrial and public works projects in past decades had displaced people from their land, the pace of industrialization has accelerated significantly in recent years, sharpening competition over land, one of the country's most coveted resources.
Peasants' protests, some of them violent, have held up several proposed projects — from steel mills to power plants to Chinese-style Special Economic Zones — postponing several billion dollars in investments over the last two years. The government has been compelled to revisit its Special Economic Zone policy, which gives generous tax incentives to developers. It is also crafting a new policy to compensate those whose lands and livelihoods are lost.
The peasant procession, which began in Gwalior, a once-royal city in the middle of the country, brought some of the most destitute Indians here to the richest city in the land. They carried sacks over their shoulders, containing a few clothes, a steel plate and cup, and thin quilts to keep themselves warm at night. Some carried umbrellas to shield themselves from the still-hot midday sun. Last week, three marchers were killed by a speeding truck along the road, in neighboring Uttar Pradesh state.
Many among the marchers were indigenous people known here as tribals and among the most vulnerable to displacement by industrial projects slated for the heavily forested, resource-rich swath across central India.
They were joined by a fair number of foreigners. The cost of the procession, about $1.25 per person per day, according to the organizers, was defrayed by some foreign-aid agencies.
The marchers' demands included enforceable property deeds and fast-track courts to settle land disputes, which can stretch on for several years. "Land. Water. Forest" read a banner strung on a jeep that led the procession.
Gudiya Bai, from a village called Jhiraha, said her extended family first lost half of its 10 acres to a limestone mine. What was left became infertile. She blames the mine for making water scarce, a claim impossible to verify. As their household income dwindled, one by one, family members went to work in the mine. Today, it employs six of her eight children, all but one of whom is under the age of 14, the legal working age in India.
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Mass Candlelight Vigil on October 2nd, 2007 to support Indian farmers and Agriculture
* Please Participate * - http://agri.aidindia.org/october2
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Abhijit Minakshi
About my name: www.geocities.com/abhijit1303/aboutname.txt