Kujang: Setting up industries on forest land and acquiring it to form land bank is considered illegal. This norm has been violated here.
Orissa Industrial Infrastructure Development Corporation (Idco) has been trying to acquire over 5,000 acre of forest land here to hand it over to industrialists, according to a report. People who have been living in the forest for over 75 years are entitled to get land pattas according to the Forest Rights Act, 2006. People of Dhinkia Charidesh (eight villages of Dhinkia, Nuagaon and Gada Kujang panchayats) have been residing in the forest along the shore for generations. They eke out a living by farming betel, paddy and fishing and had applied for land pattas as per government norms. However, the administration, instead of honoring their legal rights, is trying to evict them forcibly to safeguard the interests of industrialists, it is alleged. Though officials have been trying this for over a decade, they have not succeeded so far.
The state government had signed an agreement with Posco in 2005 to hand over 4,004 acre of land from these eight villages but the project couldn’t be executed due to strong protest by Posco Pratirodh Sangram Samiti (PPSS), a local outfit spearheading the movement.
However, the administration managed to acquire 2,700 acre of land from these village using police force, locals said. They suffered for over 10 years at the hands of the police and goons engaged by the project authorities. Meanwhile, five persons died between 2008 and 2013 in police-public clashes over land acquisition. The South Korean steel major finally had to scrap its project due to local protest, legal hassles and some other reasons.
But the dust didn’t settle even after Posco’s project withdrawal. Before the people who had lost their land to the proposed Posco project could heave a sigh of relief, the government’s attempt to acquire 5,000 acre of land and invitation to JSW to the region has triggered panic among them. The state government is all set to sign a MoU with JSW. As the company has clearly stated its intention of staying away from battles with locals unlike the case with Posco before committing itself to the project, the administration has decided to erect a boundary wall around 2,700 acre of land which it had acquired for Posco. At subsequent stages, the remaining required land would be acquired by luring or scaring the innocent villagers, it was learnt.
Recently, the government has sanctioned Rs13 crore towards construction of an 18 km-long boundary wall and a consultancy firm has been awarded the contract. The firm, in a bid to complete the job as soon as possible, extracted sand from forest land for the boundary construction. Besides, the administration is allegedly distributing money in the village to bias some villagers and create a pro-industrialisation group. Meanwhile, people of Nuagaon panchayat have demolished a boundary wall constructed by the firm.
If law is enforced in true spirit, JSW is all set to be at the receiving end for its bid to set up a steel plant across 5,000 acres including the 4,004 acre that was previously acquired by the government for Posco. Two years after signing of MoU with Posco it was learnt that the land acquired by the government was not revenue land but belonged to forest category. The state government tried its best to change the classification of the land and held palli sabhas in 2009, 2011 and 2012 to promote industrialisation. However, the people strongly opposed these moves. While the dispute over land acquisition was yet to be resolved, the administration destroyed large tracts of forests using heavy earth moving equipment. More than 6 lakh trees were felled with an objective of demoralising the locals. As the people didn’t succumb to this tactics, the Centre-appointed Saxena committee visited the region. The locals submitted the land pattas they had obtained from pre-Independence period to the committee. Land acquisition and destruction of forest stopped for a brief period after the panel reprimanded the administration for not paying heed to the pleas of the locals.
The report of two other committees – Gupta Committee and Roypal Committee – constituted by the Union government also went against the state’s industrial policy regarding land acquisition for Posco. However, the government is yet to submit the documents over revenue and forest land settlement before the National Green Tribunal and the Union forest and environment ministry. While the ownership of the land is yet to be decided, the state government has made a fresh bid to acquire the land and construct a boundary wall. The move has triggered tension in the region.
Raghunath Sahoo, OP