Large numbers of people show their opposition against the Polavaram Dam.

 

   The dam and river inter-linking project, called Polavaram project, straddles the eastern Indian state of Andhra Pradesh (AP). The AP government is promoting the project over objections from its neighbours Orissa and Chhattisgarh states that decry the project's adverse impact on local communities.

   At the heart of the squabble lies significant environmental and human rights concerns. Project critics say, construction of the dam is already inducing tribal villagers, called Adivasi, to flee to higher ground to escape inundation, taking with them a particularly unsound farming practice called 'podu'. This practice entails burning up a patch of forest, farming it for 2-3 crop cycles, and moving on in search of another pristine patch for the same purpose, scarring the earth and destroying forest cover.

BIG PROJECT...

   Concerns have begun to grow in recent months as the AP government pursues construction of the mammoth US 3-3.5 billion dollar project. First envisaged by the British in 1941, the Polavaram project aims to construct a dam on the mighty Godavari river and divert large quantities of water 174 kilometres through a link canal to the Krishna river. The dam is expected to produce 960 megawatts of power and irrigate 291,000 hectares of land in 15 of AP's 23 districts, according to a study done by India's Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF). The total land requirement for the project is 46,060 hectares. Authorities claim that the project will also provide drinking water to 2.5 million people in 540 villages on the project's route.

...BIGGER CONCERNS

   Clearly, a massive undertaking such as this is bound to raise just as massive controversies. The project's critics claim that human and environmental costs make the project too expensive to construct.

   Environmentalists are particularly concerned about the adverse effects of the project. A study by the MoEF estimated that a combined total of nearly 200,000 people would be affected by Polavaram in AP, Orissa and Chhattisgarh states. Studies carried out by Independent groups, such as a 1996 report by Godavari Krishna Vijaywada Link (GKVL) and National Council for Applied Economic Research (NCAER), found that the project would submerge an area of 63,691 hectares, mostly in AP but also in the nearby two states. Half the estimated inundated land will be agricultural, and about five percent will be forests.

   With numbers like these, the controversy is hardly likely to go away. Already, there have been reports that the local Adivasis have been moving uphill, axing more forests for farmland and homesteads. Tribals who remain in their traditional villages have put up notices to discourage AP government officials from visiting. One such notice states: "This is our village and we do not allow any body from the Government."

   P. Shivaramkrishna of Shakti, an organization fighting for the rights of the tribal, said, “The government should give a second thought on decreasing the height of the dam to minimize the sub-mergence level.” He added, “Besides, an alternate model could be find out for safeguarding the lives of the Lakh people coming under the sub-mergence zone.”

   Most recently, the major irrigation minister P. Lakshmaiah has informed that the state government has decided to retail the dam height at 150 feet as per the recommendations of the nine-member committee of experts headed by Preetam Singh, former Chairman of the Central Water Commission (CWC), which was mandated to study the issue of submersion of land under the project. 

   Non-governmental organizations have found that uphill migration of the Adivasis has contributed to deforestation. A 1994 study by NGOs had estimated that 153,000 acres of forest cover would likely lost due to such uphill migration. Even that rate is now considered conservative. M. Bharath Bhushan, one of the authors of the 1994 study who is associated with of Aranyika, a network of NGOs from the three states affected by Polavaram, says," the rate of deforestation observed in October 2005 indicates that earlier estimates are far small and do not show the real danger."

CONTROVERSY CONTINUES

   The Polavaram project has been controversial since the very beginning. Decades after the British mooted the idea, the federal government's Central Water Commission (CWC) granted hydrological clearance to the project in 1982. But opposition from activists stalled the project for years. In 2005, the AP government took up the matter seriously and declared its intention to complete the project in five years.

    But it has not been smooth-sailing. Public protests and litigation brought the project to a standstill as the AP High Court stayed work till the MoEF granted environmental clearance to the project. That clearance was contingent upon public hearings in the affected areas. Accordingly, a series of such public hearings were conducted by the state, ultimately helping it win clearance from the MoEF in October 2005.

   But critics charge that not only will the project threaten indigenous tribes, but the October 10, 2005 public hearings too were conducted haphazardly. They point out that the MoEF clearance was granted in haste after the AP government conducted such hearings in only five places - Khammam, West Godavari, East Godavari, Visakhapatnam and Krishna districts. None were held in neighbouring affected states of Orissa and Chhattisgarh.

   According to Bharath Bhushan, tribal communities that are hardly literate were not provided the executive summaries of the project in their local language before the hearings. Nor were they allowed to raise their voices during the hearings.  Besides, he adds, they were not aware about the rehabilitation packages being offered.

   "How can the project get environmental clearance when the views of tribal villagers who are going to be affected were not taken into consideration and when no proper public hearing was held?" asks Medha Patkar of the National Alliance of People's Movements (NAPM) which had presented a joint memorandum to the AP chief secretary, demanding that construction of the Polavaram dam be stopped.

NEIGHBOURING STATES ALARMED

   Manish Kunjan, former state lawmaker from Chhattisgarh's Bastar district was equally enraged over the MoEF clearance without consent from his state. "The project will submerge at least 30 villages in our state and we are not going to let that happen," he declares.

   The Chhattisgarh state government has asked AP state government to review the project, making it clear that it would not allow inundation in its territory because the benefits accrued to it is so minimal.

   Meanwhile, Orissa state's chief minister Navin Patnaik also wrote a letter to his counterpart in AP, objecting to the latter's decision to go ahead with the project without consulting Orissa. He has sought a review of the entire issue and sent a similar letter to the Central Water Commission expressing his displeasure at clearances given without his state's approval.

   But the protests have fallen on deaf ears, and it is easy to see why. India is a huge country with pockets of prosperity amid grinding poverty. So is the case with water. While parts of the country have abundant water, others remain dry for long spells. For politicians and technocrats, the obvious answer lies in technology, especially those that can bend nature to the will of "development experts" in government departments. Tellingly, politicians are loathe to oppose a project that is touted to have such wide benefits. A meeting of all political parties in January this year also gave its tacit approval to the project, though the Communist Party of India (Marxist) asked the state government to reduce the size of the dam to minimize submersion.

   R Ajayan, convener of Plachmeda Solidarity Committee commented, “It is very unfortunate that all the political parties are in favour of the dam. Though the communist parties speak about safeguarding people’s interest, in this case they are also supporting the government.”

   Ajayan also said that under the Panchyati Raj Act, It was the Gram Sabha that has got the power to decided what should be done. “But in this case,” he said, “the Gram Sabhas have been completely sidelined.”

PROJECT SUPPORTERS SEE BENEFITS

   Project supporters say, the river inter-linking is crucial for irrigation. They point out that long distance inter-basin transfer of water from surplus basins to deficit areas has been mooted for a long time.  A National Perspective Plan (NPP) formulated in 1980 by the federal government and CWC identified a number of inter-basin water transfer links to connect both peninsular and Himalayan rivers across the country. The inter-linking of Mahanadi, Godavari, Krishna, Pennar and Cauvery rivers is one of the four parts of the Peninsular Rivers Development Component of the NPP.

OTHERS SEE HIGH COSTS

   However, the benefits of Polavaram have been hyped out of proportion, claim critics. They point to a 2005 survey by GKVL and National Water Development Agency (NWDA), the project would displace at least 250 villages affecting around 20,000 houses. Other studies have put the number of likely-to-be-displaced villages at more than 300, predominantly tribal villages. (ENDS/AWW/RM/SP)