| 1000 Tigers Update | ||
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Updates 2003 November-December 2003 Source:
Scores of Forest Department “experts” have
been put on the elephants’ trail to drive them from Barajora to Bankura,
and then presumably back to the Dalma Hills.
Investments in Jharkhand
The destruction of the environment both forested and agricultural and displacement of Tribals is due to industrial development. US based Indus Inc is investing Rs.10,000 crore for setting up a 2000 MW power station at Chandil. Canada based Eastern Energy is investing rs.5,000 crore for Patratu Thermal Power Station’s 1000 MW Extension Project. US company TechAL has signed an MoU with Jharkhand for investing Rs.6,500 crore in a Greenfield alumina refining project. The site will be decided in January. All these projects are environment destructive. On the other hand recently after ten year’s chasing by the Forest Department the World Bank has released 9 crore for Project Preparation of a Participatory Forest Managemnet Project which will eventually be Rs.200 crore starting in April 2005 and ending by March 2009. The point we have to consider is how much is being invested in destruction of the environment compared to what is being done for its re-construction. Not only that, the World Bank’s Joint Forestry Project will likely promote genetically modified plants which is a further threat, and forest plantations of exotic species alien to our Jharkhand environment. Forest areas are cleared for such plantations. Regional Chief Conservator of Forests at Jamshedpur, Shree A.R.Singh, said the prime aim of the Joint Forestry Project was to improve the livelihood of forest-dependant communities. Unfortunately, on the other hand giant corporations are entering Jharkhand freely and destroying forest resources in the name of development. In the western part of North Karanpura the two huge opencast mines planned- Magadh and Amrapalli have received environmental clearance at the directive of the Chief Conservator, of Forests, Jharkhand, against the specific information of the investigating officer S.H Kazmi who recommended non issuance of environmental clearance since the area was a prime wildlife habitat and corridor for elephants, tigers, leopards, etc. The clearance for the mining has been given and presently (December 2003) fourteen Adivasi villages will be forcibly displaced, and the mine will destroy the last existing forest corridor between Latehar-Palamau and Hazaribagh-Chatra. Who sees to these ground realities in the busy high power planning of the State? To the east of Magadh and Amrapalli Garhi dam and North Karanpura Super Thermal Power Project are coming up, and in this area forest corridors and archaeological sites will be destroyed and several villages displaced. The dams will submerge several major archaeological sites, including a Mauryan site, and a prehistoric Rockart Site (Sidpa).
The Parej East mine was but a few years back a
verdant forest with smiling forest villages and big old Sarnas (Sacred
Grove). Today a 25sq.km 300 feet deep mine exists there. The last hamlet,
Agaria Toli, sits perched on the edge of the mine facing blasting five
times a day. The thirty five Agaria and Munda inhabitants have no drinking
water, but they are under notice of eviction. No resettlement plan is
offered.
A BRIEF REPORT FROM THE UPPER DAMODAR
VALLEY The mining of the upper Damodar valley is going on apace, and it is receiving the full cooperation of the new government in the new tribal state of Jharkhand. The mining area of the North Karanpura Valley in which the area falls was declared a sensitive tiger and elephant habitat and corridor after which the World Bank in 2001 withdrew its support to the mining project, which was a great victory for wildlifers and environmentalists. Stories of corporate clashes with tribals in this sensitive region, however continue. In 2000 TISCO destroyed an important spring in its mining operations area at Agaria Tola. Similar destruction of vital drinking water sources of local villagers goes on regularly in mining areas. Sacred groves even are not spared. There is no concern by the state for the forest environment which is rapidly disappearing in the face of unprecedented mining pressure, mainly in exploitation of coal. In 2003 the Jharkhand government’s website appeared on the Internet devoting space for Jharkhand as a mecca for mining directed at multinational corporations, but no mention is made of Jharkhand as a region of forests in dire need of protection. In fact the forests receive no mention! We are dealing with a conspiracy between the state government and the capitalists in exploiting Jharkhand’s natural and cultural assets and violating the UN’s mandate for protection of indigenous societies. Ethnic culture and forests are directly related in a tropical forest region like Jharkhand. The upper Damodar Valley was earmarked as a vast coal mining area in 1986 and the first three opencast mines were started with Australian technology (Piperwar, Ashoka-I and Ashoka-II) and despite a study by INTACH (The Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage 1992/93) and a further study by the CISMHE (Centre for Interdisciplinary Studies of Mountain & Hill Environment) commissioned by MoEF, which both indicated the forests of the valley as transit corridors for tigers and elephants between Hazaribagh and Palamau (Project Tiger), mining continued. Two more mines were finally given environmental clearance by MoEF despite adverse report of DFO (East), Hazaribagh. Now the Jharkhand government has cleared five more mines for operation in the eastern end of the valley (May 2003). Over two hundred Adivasi villages will be destroyed and over seventy five new mines are slated to be started destroying 2000sq.km of dense forests and reverine environment in the richest tiger habitat in India. We are seeing the last of India’s forests wantonly destroyed. If one studies the advance of outside cultures into tribal territories a singular pattern emerges – the destruction of trees and forests which harbour the culture of ethnic societies. This is a lesson of history. As long as forests remain ethnic cultures remain as root cultures, no matter how modernized they become. Western and Central Europe are best examples. Without forests root cultures die. Today the destruction of India’s forests is the result of a concerted plan for extermination of tribals and for bringing them into a non tribal society as second class citizens, thereby meeting no resistance in exploiting the mineral hydel and forest wealth of their habitats, in which the government is aided and abetted by giant corporations, contractors, middlemen, and the bureaucracy, not to mention the politician. There is the latest report of CCL destruction of fourteen villages in Western North Karanpura Valley in Magadh projected opencast mine block in the Magadh-Amrapalli region in the specific corridor surveyed by Kazmi and recommended against giving environmental clearance for the new mines. This had been overlooked by the Chief Conservator of Forests who recommended the mine clearance be given. The final result of the mining company’s plan to gain the land for mining in this region has borne fruit. The displacement will take place in December 2003. Also in the region are the areas of the North Karanpura valley in which the Garhidam is being located to serve the North Karanpura Super Thermal Power Project which will also submerge several villages and a Mauryan archaeological site and possibly prehistoric rockart site at Sidpa. Also, other archaeological and palaeoarchaeological sites will be submerged along with several villages in the Garhi dam, and similar destruction will take place in Amrapalli projected mine Block. All these contagious areas are directly in the elephant corridor north of Sat-pahar range. This is to be seen in the context of the concurrent clearance given to five opencast coal mines at the eastern end of the valley (Mitra, Babupara, Gondalpura, Badam, Serengara). Recently the Chief Minister of Jharkhand, Shri Arjun Munda, announced that mining would be the core sector for revenue generation for the State (Hindustan Times, Ranchi, 3rd December issue). He indicated that the government is going to lease out more mines to private parties to raise the revenue from mining from 850 crore to 3,000 crore. He said “Around 40 percent of the nation’s mineral revenues are in Jharkhand.”
A hundred percent increase in mining is
expected over India in the next five years. This bodes ill for the
forests, wildlife, and Tribals.
August 2003 These developments will have their specific consequences on Thousand Tigers Ecosystem. The tribal forests of Damur-i-koh which covers several blocks in Godda, Sahibganj, Pakur, and Dumka districts with a population of 500,000 Mal-Pahariya and Santal tribals has now been arbitrarily declared as Reserve Forests and given over to the Forest Department. This has triggered fierce tribal resistance. The tribals are considered encroachers in their own forests. Upto now this insidious process of appropriating tribal lands for coal mines and other state projects like roads and railways was going on clandestinely, but now it is egged on by a new committee having two wildlifers from the public domain and three Ministry of Environment officials constituted by the Supreme Court. The wildlifers are no friends of the tribals. The blanket notifications declaring all kinds of tribal lands for the WTO regimen. It will hand over arbitrarily to the Forest Department village forests, grazing lands, natural grasslands, ponds and wetlands, areas inhabited by primitive tribes, lands under shifting or settled cultivation by tribals. On the heels of this alarming news comes the accelerating of mine clearance for five new mines in the eastern part of the North Karanpura Valley. In a major shift in policy the Union Coal Ministry has decided to allow five State Public Sector Undertakings to take over coal mining operations replacing coal India. They will undertake coal mining in thirtyone new mines across Jharkhand, West Bengal, Maharashtra and Chattisgarh. The new mines allotted to the State Mineral Development Corporation of Jharkhand in the North Karanpura Valley are Mitra, Babupara, Gondalpura, Badam, and Serengara, all in the eastern part of the valley. Official sources stated they gave the mining a green signal, saying “All previous restrictions would be liberalized to extract maximum benefit by roping in the State Public Sector Undertakings.” Two bigdams are planned at the either end of the Valley, on Tandwa River in the West and Badam River in the East. Further it is reported that a steel plant is being planned for the middle of the Valley.
It seems that the WTO regimen is uncontrollable at the present time and only
a moral realization and “change of heart”, can stop the devastation of both
the forests and the tribes which have protected it for so long.
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Copyright©2003 Bulu Imam,
"Sanskriti".
All rights reserved. |
