[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]
DAM-L corrections to Press Release re Narmada demo in NY, USA
----- Forwarded message from owner-irn-narmada@netvista.net -----
From owner-irn-narmada@netvista.net Tue Nov 21 14:46:16 2000
Return-Path: <owner-irn-narmada@netvista.net>
Received: from DaVinci.NetVista.net (mjdomo@mail.netvista.net [206.170.46.10])
by lox.sandelman.ottawa.on.ca (8.8.7/8.8.8) with ESMTP id OAA14097
for <dianne@sandelman.ottawa.on.ca>; Tue, 21 Nov 2000 14:46:15 -0500 (EST)
From: owner-irn-narmada@netvista.net
Received: [(from mjdomo@localhost)
by DaVinci.NetVista.net (8.10.0/8.8.8) id eALJBYw00644
for irn-narmada-list; Tue, 21 Nov 2000 11:11:34 -0800 (PST)
(envelope-from owner-irn-narmada@netvista.net)]
Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2000 11:11:34 -0800 (PST)
Message-Id: <200011211911.eALJBYw00644@DaVinci.NetVista.net>
subject: LS: Update on NY Demo
Sender: owner-irn-narmada@netvista.net
Precedence: bulk
Hello everyone,
here is the final version of the press release of the demo (written by
Shankar, with a few after-the fact details added by Chandana and me!).
Please send out to relevant places.
Sheila
---------- Forwarded message ----------
For Immediate Release: November 10, 2000
For more information, contact
Sheila Ghose (212) 627-4659
Nandita Ghosh (718) 446-9107
Narmada Solidarity Coalition Condemns Indian Supreme Court Go Ahead for
Sardar Sarovar Dam
Protest demonstration held outside the Indian Consulate in New York
city on Friday, November 10th.
Narmada Solidarity Coalition of New York strongly condemns the majority
(2-to-1) ruling on October 18th by the Indian Supreme Court allowing
construction to resume on the Sardar Sarovar Dam on the Narmada River.
To protest this ruling, the Coalition and other sympathizers of people
affected by the mega-dam gathered outside the Indian Consulate on
Friday, November 10th. The protesters waved placards saying
"Indian Supreme Court sentences 500,000 to poverty and despair" and "56
million people displaced by dams in India: leave Narmada alone!" and
chanted slogans in Hindi and English in support of the people and against
the dam project. The demonstration is part of a world-wide wave of
protests against the court ruling; demonstrations have been held in San
Francisco, Washington D.C. and London, among other places.
The ruling allows the height of the dam to be raised to 90 meters immediately
and then in further five-meter stages based on approval from government
committees which have shown themselves to be controlled by pro-dam interests.
This is despite the Madhya Pradesh government's admission that it has
not been able to provide agricultural land to 156 families (a number which is
in fact a gross underestimate) whose land would be flooded if the dam reaches
90m. This means that construction up to 90m would violate the Narmada
Tribunal Award which mandates that an affected family should be resettled a
full year before their land is submerged.
The Sardar Sarovar Project is one of the world's most controversial dam
projects and would forcibly displace more people than any other
infrastructure project in the world except for China's notorious Three Gorges
Dam. "Sardar Sarovar symbolizes an outdated and internationally
discredited approach to water management," says Patrick McCully of the
International Rivers Network. One of the claims to justify the building of
the dam has been that it will provide water for irrigation in the
drought-prone areas of Saurashtra in Gujarat. However, M.S.Patel, Secretary
of Narmada (water resources and water supply) of the Gujarat government, has
accepted that only 10%-12% of the entire cropped area will be irrigated by
the dam.
The Narmada Bachao Andolan (Save the Narmada Movement) filed their case
against Sardar Sarovar in 1994. The NBA presented the court with evidence
showing that the project will not work as planned, that alternatives are
available, that the necessary environmental studies have not been done, and
that proper rehabilitation of the hundreds of thousands of people who would
lose their livelihoods to the project is impossible. The NBA have for more
than a decade led a mass campaign of non-violent resistance to the dam.
One of the three judges on the Supreme Court bench, Justice S.P. Bharucha,
issued a dissenting opinion stating that construction should be stopped
pending new environmental studies.
The court has given project authorities four weeks to draw up a plan for
the resettlement and rehabilitation of the 200,000 people to be displaced
by the Sardar Sarovar Reservoir. A resettlement plan for Sardar Sarovar
was supposed to have been completed in 1981. How can we expect the Narmada
Control Authority to draft a credible plan in a month, when they couldn't
produce one in over a decade?
Several hundred thousand other people will lose - or have already lost their
livelihoods to irrigation canals, housing for construction workers, the
desiccation of the river downstream of the dam, and a wildlife reserve
planned to compensate for the ecosystems to be flooded.
Narmada Solidarity Coalition of New York and Friends of River Narmada are
volunteer-based international coalitions of individuals and organizations
that provide a solidarity network for the Narmada Bachao Andolan which has
been fighting for the democratic rights of the citizens of the Narmada Valley.
For more information and reactions on the Supreme Court judgment see
www.narmada.org
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe from this list, send a message to majordomo@netvista.net
with no subject and the following text in the body of the message
"unsubscribe irn-narmada".
----- End of forwarded message from owner-irn-narmada@netvista.net -----