The struggle for justice is indivisible

Why in the News

Adivasi and Dalit families displaced by three water projects in Madhya Pradesh’s Panna and Chhatarpur districts are being moved without the rehabilitation and forest rights recognition the law requires first. Divya Ahirwar, a ward councillor who led their movement, was jailed in September on an attempted murder charge and has since been granted bail by the Madhya Pradesh High Court.

What are the three projects, and whom do they affect?

1. Two irrigation dams: The State government’s Majhgaya and Runjh medium irrigation dams, begun over a decade ago, are nearly complete. Hundreds of mostly Adivasi households still await fair compensation.
2. Ken-Betwa link: The Ken-Betwa river-linking project builds a 96.7 metre high dam near Daudhan on the Ken river. The dam will carry water to dry Bundelkhand and neighbouring Uttar Pradesh.
3. Forest and tiger land: The Supreme Court’s central empowered committee found two-thirds of the land needed was forest, much of it in the Panna Tiger Reserve. About 2.3 million trees face felling.
4. People affected: About 8,000 Adivasi families across 22 villages are directly affected by the Ken-Betwa project.
5. The takeaway: Projects meant to water a drought-prone region are taking land and forest from communities not yet resettled.

What does the law require before people are moved?

1. Resettle before submergence: For irrigation projects, Section 38(1) of the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013 (LARR Act) requires displaced families to be rehabilitated six months before their land goes under water.
2. Outdated cut-off date: An incomplete survey undervalued land, houses and trees. An unrevised 2018 cut-off date denies separate compensation to those who were minors then and are adults now.
3. Rights before eviction: Section 4(5) of the Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act, 2006 (FRA) bars eviction until forest rights are recognised. No affected village has had its rights recognised, and no gram sabha (village assembly) has given consent.
4. Voluntary relocation: Four villages lie in the reserve’s core, where the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972 allows only voluntary relocation. The relocation under way here is not voluntary.
5. Gram sabha precedent: In the Niyamgiri case (2013), the Supreme Court protected ancestral Adivasi land from being taken without gram sabha consent. Sacred groves here face the same loss.

What has displacement meant on the ground?

1. Banharikala village: Water held back by the Majhgaya dam flooded homes and crops, forcing distress sales of livestock. Compensation rose from Rs 5 lakh to Rs 12.5 lakh only after protests.
2. Families left out: Scores of families have received nothing, so children have dropped out of school and households are deep in debt.
3. Resettlement colony: Ken-Betwa evacuees got stony 20 by 50 feet plots without water or a nearby school. They received paper slips with plot numbers in place of land titles.
4. Second displacement: Within months, 10 families were told to move again because their new land is needed for a canal.

How have families protested, and how has the State responded?

1. Chita andolan: In this funeral pyre movement, residents lie on pyres, put heads in nooses or stand waist-deep in water, under the slogan “Nyay do ya maar do” (give us justice or kill us).
2. State response: The State sent police battalions and cut electricity. Police allegedly beat the councillor during the protest.
3. Arrest of leaders: Amit Bhatnagar of the Jai Kisan Sangathan co-led the movement and held a weeks-long hunger strike. He has also faced arrest.
4. Constitutional framing: The fight for the right to life (Article 21) and protests over the right to vote (Article 326) are one struggle. The same pattern appears at Simjhali, Odisha, and the Santhal Parganas.

Challenges

1. Judicial delay: The committee’s case has stayed frozen in the Supreme Court since 2019. Construction continues, so submergence can become irreversible first.
2. Doubtful water availability: The committee questioned whether the Ken has sufficient water.
3. Cash cannot replace forests: A cash package does not replace a forest-based livelihood.

Way Forward

1. Revised cut-off date: Reset eligibility to the date of actual acquisition so grown children get separate entitlements.
2. Rights before relocation: Settle individual and community forest rights claims in every affected village before any eviction.
3. Early hearing: The Supreme Court should take up the committee’s findings before river diversion makes submergence irreversible.

Conclusion

The projects promise water to Bundelkhand, but the legal order of rehabilitation and rights recognition before submergence is being reversed. Whether it is restored before the reservoirs fill will decide if this displacement follows the law.

Matching Previous Year Question

“[2020, GS1, 15 marks] The interlinking of rivers can provide viable solutions to the multi-dimensional inter-related problems of droughts, floods and interrupted navigation. Critically examine. (नदियों को आपस में जोड़ना सूखा, बाढ़ और बाधित जल-परिवहन जैसी बहु-आयामी अन्तर्सम्बन्धित समस्याओं का व्यवहार्य समाधान दे सकता है l आलोचनात्मक परिक्षण कीजिए l)”