In an exclusive interview to NGI, Ms. Patkar finds a platform to share her point of view with our erudite readers all over the globe. This detailed interview is valuable especially for those who feel persiscoped from the “whole” picture of India’s development. On one hand you are periodically bombarded with the spit-and-polish gloss of urban India and on the other, you never really find out who pays a price for the non-inclusive development. In Medha Patkar, hear the voice of reason. Here is a voice that is strongly advocating a larger point of view that should not merely read as anti-progress as it is at heart, a movement representing a nation… holistically.
Some excerpts…
Over the past two decades you have been spearheading a struggle against dam projects that threaten the livelihood of people. How much success have you achieved in your efforts?
It is better that others tally successes and failures. There are two sides to any story. On the one hand, the downtrodden and underprivileged sections of society achieve something which they wouldn’t have done without a struggle. This means stopping projects which are destructive and which lead to encroachment by the state or corporations upon their life supporting resources. Non-violent or satyagraha based movements have stopped SEZs in Raigad in Maharashtra, Kakinada in Andhra Pradesh, Nandigram and Singur in West Bengal. Even the Narmada dams have been stopped, considering the social and environmental impacts which had not been taken into account.
Local activists also access and analyse information through the Right to Information Act. So they are empowered and emboldened to challenge the basics rather than just taking care of the impacts which are never taken care of because there is no real political will to take care of the social and environmental side. So I think the civil society syndrome that is being questioned by political parties is also because of this. Instead of going to political parties or even after going to political parties, people realise that movements are the only way out. One of the main criticisms that is levelled against you by your opponents is that you take pride in stalling projects, retard progress, facilitate growth of slums and in the process appear on the front pages of newspapers and TV channels regularly. Please comment.
We’re not on the front pages of newspapers or rather the mainstream media. And if we do, it is because of mass agitations. If the masses are demanding something, it needs to be propagated and be considered by the state. This is our position and it is permitted by democracy. And what we’re questioning is not progress or development per se but the paradigm path or vision that is followed by the rulers favouring a small section of the population which are only keen on making more profits through monopolising resources and power.
We demand the fulfillment of the basic needs of the population by not considering some as ‘more equal’. So wherever we see displacement or destruction or disparity being furthered in the name of development, we along with the people affected question it. Everyone has a right to do this in a democracy. As you know equality, justice, self reliance and brotherhood are the values that are enshrined in the framework of our constitution. Some questions we ask are – Why is everything going in favour of the ‘haves’? Why are resources being transferred to corporate without considering any value or any sensitivity to the crushing of generations old communities? Say one resource like river water, if the river valleys are going to be killed and rivers are going to die, then what remains? So we want interest to be drawn from natural resource capital without destroying the capital itself. And questioning this would bring the society and the state onto the right path of equitable and sustainable development. If you are killing natural resources at the local and national levels, no one gains anything. No amount of monetary investment is going to regenerate the eco-systems which have been irreversibly destroyed.
Media is a means to an end. We are not at all compromising with our values or our means to pursue media. We’re not even compromising with our priorities at work but we certainly need to propagate our messages. 96% of our population which is the basis of our economy doesn’t have a voice when it comes to articulating their problems. So if the media is taking up some of their issues through the social activists it should be welcomed. If I had my wish I would have loved to have media interview the common folk, the farmers, the fisherfolk, the labourers but I guess media needs a face, so ultimately it is up to social activists to articulate what the poor people have told and taught them.
Why have you not participated in the protest against the Jaitapur Nuclear Power Plant in your home region of Konkan in Maharashtra? What is your stand about nuclear projects?
We’re against nuclear power. The dangers of nuclear power are being proven from Chernobyl to Japan. Earthquakes in Japan were a way of life and the Japanese had adapted to living with them, but the effects that they had on nuclear plants was disastrous resulting in a huge loss of lives and livelihood. Although these facts are being suppressed by companies that are involved in supplying to nuclear power plants and those who have a vested interest in furthering nuclear power.
I did not go to Jaitapur as I did not feel comfortable to take up a major role there. I’m already there as a supporter. It so happens that if one goes to the area then there are a lot of things that one has to do. My hands are so full that I’ve not been able to take time off for even a minute. But my NABM colleagues, right from Gabriella Dietrich to Dr. Sugandh Barant have been to Jaitapur and are playing a keen supporting role. We do not want to replace any leadership that is already present in the movement. But there has never been an instance that they’ve asked us to do something and we’ve not done it. Letters of support, resolutions, our people out-reach etc. For instance for this coming Independence Day, I’ve convinced Swami Agnivesh to go to Jaitapur as I felt his presence there would make more of an impact than my going. We have also criticized and condemned the undemocratic way that the Maharashtra government has used to handle the agitation. We have a basic position on nuclear power but in the meanwhile we support a number of other ways to produce renewable sources of energy. We want a budget and political attention to be diverted to the micro hydel projects that we have built in Narmada Valley and other sources of power like solar winds. Nuclear energy is neither economic nor sustainable.
What is your vision on sustainable development?
According to us, sustainability is a test of how you use natural resources and how much you leave for the coming generations. And if this has to happen then it is related to who owns the resources and to the choice of technology in using those resources. It is also dependent on the process of planning to use or reuse those resources. And ultimately it depends on the distribution of resources. There is a politico-economic framework which has to be applied in resource planning, resource harnessing and utilization of resources. Take water for example, everyone needs water. If you start using it and start harnessing the water you have a number of options which you need to start with. Micro or Mini water share or directly a whole river valley which you think is yours, as the rulers do, and then you take it to the next river valley and have an inter-basin kind of transfer of resources through the most ambitious of plans or if you will start with the smallest water shares, you will harness the land as well as the water. Start from the first drop of water that falls and think of how much can and should be percolated and stored, not in surface reservoirs which would submerge and destroy the best of agricultural land irreversibly, but in underground water reservoirs.
So I think sustainability is invariably linked to the values of equality and justice. And lifestyle matters as otherwise you may draw beautiful plans of compensating the resources, like you cut the natural forests and then you say you will have monocultural plantations and you say that you are replacing the green cover, but the value of bio-diversity once lost is lost forever. So I think the claims of compensation will not stand as some things are not replaceable. And that is what is true about natural resources. We need to follow Gandhian principles by understanding that there is enough on this earth to feed everyone’s needs but no one’s greed.
Earlier you have mentioned an Alternate Development Strategy. Could you elaborate what is your ADS and what is the response of the government?
The Alternate Development Strategy would involve first and foremost the agenda of democratization that will truly take the power to the people. That means the roles and the rights in development plans should first be granted to the smallest of the units in democracy. Those units which are perfect for direct democracy. Villages for example, the urban, rural or the adivasi communities, where a direct face-to-face interaction would be possible. Now no doubt there is a hierarchy within, there is an inequity within, the dalits still live at the peripheries even in the village community. And yet correcting the undemocratic or corrupt processes is more possible there than in the larger units.
This democratization would also begin with the people in the communities which are socio-economic units and which can also be remapped on the basis of ecological units. We can have villages just as states are drawn on the basis of rivers or hills as borders. Why can’t we also have water shares as one of the units? That would define our village boundaries. A little bit of change is possible but ultimately there should be socio-economic linkages along with ecological considerations, and these kinds of communities should have the first right to resources in their domains. They would be the ones who would first develop plans, then would come the next unit and so on. Currently these kinds of right levels of democratic units are not given any rights or any space in the politico-economic process. We want this to be changed.
Furthermore, we would also want that the state to ensure that the community is not allowed to destroy the resources. But the maximum power should be granted to the lowest level where it is feasible to be planned and implemented. This would bring in more of equity and justice. And this is very much reflected in the Panchayati Raj which is a part of our constitution and which has also been amended from time to time till 1992-1993. This was when the 73rd and 74th amendment brought into the constitution the role of the gram sabhas in the rural areas and ward sabhas in the urban areas. Now that would mean that the gram sabhas would decide as to whether a particular development plan, that has been proposed, was acceptable or not. This is the real democratic democratic process of planned development.
The next would be the choice of technology which would mean that we should promote those kinds of technologies in the sourcing of power or housing technology, for example, which would need a minimum of destruction of resources which would be reversible and replaceable. If you’re eating up your capital then you are going to suffer to the worst extent possible in time. (This detailed interview will be carried in two parts. Part 1 in August current issue will be continued as Part 2 in the September Issue of the New Global Indian.)
