guardian.co.uk,
Jason Burke in Delhi, Sunday 8 April 2012
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| Women from the Dongria Kondh tribe sit under a tree at the foot of the Niyamgiri hills, which they worship as their living god. Photograph: Reinhard Krause/Reuters |
The leaders
of thousands of forest-dwelling tribesmen who have fought for years to preserve
their ancestral lands from exploitation by an international mining corporation
have promised to continue their struggle whatever the decision in a key hearing
before India's supreme court on Monday.
Dubbed the
"real-life Avatar" after the Hollywood blockbuster, the battle of the Dongria Kondh people to stop the London-based conglomerate Vedanta Resources
from mining bauxite from a hillside they consider sacred has attracted
international support. Celebrities backing the campaign include James Cameron,
the director of Avatar, Arundhati Roy, the Booker prize-winning author, as well
as the British actors Joanna Lumley and Michael Palin.
On Monday
the court will decide on an appeal by Vedanta against a ministerial decision in 2010 that stopped work at the site in the Niyamgiri hills of India's eastern
Orissa state.
Lingaraj
Azad, a leader of the Save Niyamgiri Committee, said the Dongria Kondh's
campaign was "not just that of an isolated tribe for its customary rights
over its traditional lands and habitats, but that of the entire world over
protecting our natural heritage".
An alliance
of local tribes has now formed to defend the Dongria Khondh. Kumity Majhi, a
leader of the Majhi Kondh adivasi (indigenous people), said local communities
would stop the mining "whether or not the supreme court favour us".
"We,
the Majhi Kondh adivasis, will help our Dongria Kondh brothers in protecting
the mountains," he said.
India's
rapid economic growth has generated huge demand for raw materials. Weak law
enforcement has allowed massive environmental damage from mining and other
extractive industries, according to campaigners.
Vedanta,
which wants the bauxite for an alumina refinery it has built near the hills,
requires clearance under the country's forest and environmental laws. But
though it had obtained provisional permission, it failed to satisfy laws
protecting the forests and granting rights to local tribal groups.
A
government report accused the firm of violations of forest conservation, tribal
rights and environmental protection laws in Orissa, a charge subsequently
repeated by a panel of forestry experts.
Jairam
Ramesh, the then environment minister, decided that Vedanta would not be
allowed to mine the bauxite because "laws [were] being violated".
At the
time, a spokesman denied the company had failed to obtain the consent of the
tribal groups. "Our effort is to bring the poor tribal people into the
mainstream," Vedanta Aluminium's chief operating officer, Mukesh Kumar,
said shortly before the 2010 decision.
Since then
the company has made efforts to win over local and international opinion. This
weekend Vedanta, contacted through their London-based public relations firm,
declined to comment.
Many Indian
businessmen say economic growth must be prioritised even at the expense of the
environment or the country's most marginalised communities. They argue these
are the inevitable costs of development.
Ramesh was
considered the first environment minister to take on major corporate interests
after decades where legal constraints on business were routinely ignored. But
his stance caused a rift within the government and he was moved to a different
ministry.
Chandra
Bhushan, of the Centre for Science and Environment in Delhi, said the outcome
of the court case would either be "very encouraging for business or very
encouraging for civil society".
"There
are so many reasons not to mine there [in the Niyamgiri hills], the court could
only overturn it on procedural grounds. Otherwise it will send a signal of
total political paralysis," he told the Guardian.
The supreme
court may decide to send the case to the newly constituted national green
tribunal, a body of legal and technical experts, to consider once more.
Last week
the tribunal suspended the environmental permits for the massive Posco iron and
steel refinery, also in Orissa. The project would see an £8bn investment from a
South Korean firm, and would significantly enhance India's industrial capacity
as well as generating hundreds of jobs. The tribunal decided however that
studies on its environmental impact had been based on a smaller venture and
were thus invalid.
Elsewhere
in India, power plants, dams, factories, roads and other infrastructure
projects are stalled pending environmental clearance. There are frequent
reports of clashes over land throughout the country. In February, Survival
International, a UK-based campaign group, said it received reports of arrests and beatings apparently aimed at stopping a major religious festival in the
Niyamgiri hills where Vedanta's bauxite mine is planned.
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