Dear Friends,
Anti POSCO struggle in the Indian state of Orissa urgently require your help!
Pohang Iron and Steel Company (POSCO), the South Korea based steel giant is moving forward with its plans to build a steel mill in Jagatsingpura in the north-eastern part of Orissa, India. The mill, also involves mining at Keonjhar and a new port just north of Paradip. In all, over 30 villages are targets for forced displacement. The villagers are continuously protesting in one form or the other for the last two years under the leadership of the POSCO Pratirodh Sangram Samiti (PPSS).
The government of Orissa had issued a deadline that ended on 10 February for filing applications for compensation and there has been a rapid buildup of police force in the area. A PPSS protest and peaceful sit-in is in its second week now and the threat of an attack on the people and forced entry into the lands and occupation by government forces looms large.
Please call the Chief Minister of Orissa, Mr. Naveen Panaik and the state’s Chief Secretary of Environment and Forests Mr. U. N. Behara, today. You can also send your request through fax in the numbers provided below.
Please request the Chief Minister and the Chief Secretary to immediately stop all plans of forced occupation of land. Remind them that the POSCO project will adversely impact both Adivasis (original inhabitants of the land; tribal populations) and non-Adivasis, destroy a delicate ecosystem with a remunerative betel leaf cultivation system.
Please ask the government to implement the Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act, 2006 (in short the Forest Rights Act).
We would like to hear the responses that you get from the government. Please write back to us with a brief note on the response. Please find below a Press Release from PPSS and an article that appeared in the mainstream press in India this month about the issue.
Please call as soon as possible.
1. Mr. Naveen Patnaik
Chief Minister and Minister for Forests and Environment
Government of Orissa
Bhubaneswar, Orissa
INDIA
Tel: + 91 674 2531100; 2535100; 2531500
Fax: + 91 674 2392115
2. Mr. U. N. Behara
Principal Secretary
Department of Environment and Forests
Government of Orissa
Bhubaneswar, Orissa
INDIA
Tel: +91 674 2595503; 2536822
Fax: +91 674 2395820
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PRESS RELEASE: URGENT!
Fear of Attack on Anti-POSCO Movement
Balitutha, Orissa: The threat of state and POSCO sponsored violence looms large over hundreds of farmers sitting on an indefinite sit in at Balitutha in Jagatsinghpur district against the Orissa government’s pet POSCO steel project.
Since 26 January this year the farmers have been carrying out their peaceful protest against fresh attempts by the Naveen Patnaik regime to acquire their land on behalf of the South Korean steel corporation.
“We are expecting police action any time soon including an attack on our leader Mr. Abhay Sahoo by goons hired by the company,” said a spokesperson of the POSCO Pratirodh Sangram Samithi (PPSS), which has spearheaded the agitation against the project for the past five years.
Over 30,000 farmers are expected to lose their lands and livelihood if the US$12 billion project, billed as India’s largest Foreign Direct Investment, is implemented. POSCO signed a MoU with the Orissa state government in 2005, for the setting up of an integrated steel and power plant, a private port and mining of over 600 million tones of Orissa’s high grade iron ore.
For the steel and power plants alone the project needs around 4004 acres, of which 3566 acres is government owned forest and revenue land but 438 acres belongs to local farmers who are refusing to part with it. The PPSS apprehends that over 25 platoons of police are being brought in to surround the farmers sitting on dharna (protest) at Balitutha, which is at the entrance to the land that belongs to them.
According to a letter issued by the District Collector of Jagatsinghpur, on January 19 this year, the Palli Sabhas (Palli Sabha is the meeting of all the electorates of a revenue village) in the project area have been asked to obtain approval of local bodies about the ‘diversion of their lands under forest category to POSCO’ by February 10th. On February 3 however, at a meeting of the Palli Sabha of Nuagaon village, all the 700 participants unanimously disapproved the move. In a resolution passed at the Palli Sabha they said that such lands were being used by the people for cultivation and housing since last 300 years and in no case they can be handed over to POSCO. Other Palli Sabhas in the area are expected to pass similar resolutions.
PPSS activists say, faced with the firm opposition to the POSCO project and land acquisition, the Orissa administration is getting desperate and plans to remove the farmers by force. On February 1 the state government issued a notice in the newspapers that if the people fail to file their claims for compensation within fifteen days, they will get nothing at all.
The PPSS dharna has found support around the country with the leaders of trade unions and people’s movements visiting the protestors sitting on dharna. Those participating in the dharna include leaders of the All India Trade Union Congress from different states and the Orissa Bidi leaf Workers and Domestic Workers Associations.
(Bidi is a thin, South Asian cigarette made of 0.2 – 0.3 grams of tobacco flake wrapped in a tendu or temburini; or Diospyros melonoxylon)
For further information contact:
Mr. Prashant Paikray, spokesperson, PPSS at Ph: +91 9437571547
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Please call:
1. Mr. Naveen Patnaik
Chief Minister and Minister for Forests and Environment
Government of Orissa
Bhubaneswar, Orissa
INDIA
Tel: + 91 674 2531100; 2535100; 2531500
Fax: + 91 674 2392115
2. Mr. U. N. Behara
Principal Secretary
Department of Environment and Forests
Government of Orissa
Bhubaneswar, Orissa
INDIA
Tel: +91 674 2595503; 2536822
Fax: +91 674 2395820
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°ü·Ã Á¤º¸¸¦ À§ÇÑ ¿¬¶ôó:
Prashant Paikray, PPSS ´ëº¯ÀÎ ÀüÈ +91 9437571547
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