MEDHA PATKAR

A SOCIAL ACTIVIST OF INDIA

IT REALLY REQUIRES A COURAGE.
Born in Bombay, India on December 1, 1954.

Raised by two politically and socially active

parents.

M.A. in Social Work from the Tata Institute of

Social Science in 1980

After her Master's degree, she worked for seven

years with voluntary organizations
Provide safe drinking water to 30 million
people
Irrigate 4.8 million hectares of land
Produce 550 megawatts of power
Provide 1,300 cubic-meters of water per
yr.for municipal and industrial purposes
Provide a drainage system to carry away
floodwaters
It will also take the land of 320,000 people
 The cost of the project was estimated at $200 million,
actual cost is $450 million

 Investors are the World Bank until 1993 (when they

withdrew), Gov. of Gujarat (state where the Sardar Sarovar
dam is located) and S.Kumars (India’s leading textile
companies)

 It will displace 180,000 more than projected and affect

700,000 livelihoods
Dalits and Adivasi (Local Residents).
Many of these people are uneducated and very few
can read and write.
“NARMADA BACHAO ANDOLAN .” Started by
Medha Patkar in 1986.
Arundhati Roy; Booker Prize-winning author
supporter of the Save the Narmada Movement; wrote
a book about the Dams in India called ‘The Greater
Common Good’.
Baba Amte; a social worker whose work with leprosy
has earned him much respect in the country among
the tribal people and government officials.
• Indian Government supports the building of dams
• The World Bank supported the Sardar Sarovar Dam
Project and loaned India $450 million. They withdrew
from the project after an independent review confirmed
social and environmental impacts were increasing.
• The Supreme Court of India has ruled on the Sardar
Sarovar Dam. In 1995 they suspended work on the dam
because the height exceeded the amount originally
planned, 75m. In 1999 they ordered work to continue up
to the height of 85m. Then in Oct 18, 2000 they ruled in
favor of building the Sardar Sarovar despite global protests
• Mr Vyas, Gujarat's Minister for Narmada Irrigation.
It was a protest by the NBA
called 'satyagraha' that
caught the World Banks
attention.

They sent in an
independent review team
headed by Hugh Brody, a
British anthropologist and
Donald Gamble, a
Canadian environmental
engineer.
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/wideangle/shows/dammed/photo.html
 No environmental impact report
 No assessment on the effects of people living down stream despite a previous
report by the bank regarding increased salinity that would destroy fishing
grounds, increase in silt and the project would only be able to irrigate 5% of
what was initially stated.
 People have died because of malaria. A previous report from the bank said
the project was ‘taking malaria to the doorsteps of the villagers’. But the
report stated the measures promised to prevent this were ‘not yet due’.
 Inadequate resettlement plans, some villages haven’t even received a
resettlement plan and their villages have already been destroyed.

“The politicians used drought-stricken populations to justify their big dams,

despite knowing that the projects can never deliver”
Hugh Brody, from independent review team for the World Bank
• Threat to aquatic habitat – barriers for fish passage, water
quality is affected because of change in land use can also
affect aquatic life
• Water logging – excess water in the soil and can render
the soil useless. This could affect 40% of the area to be
irrigated.
• Salinisation – when irrigation water has more saline
content and adds more salt to the system. This happens
because the land to be irrigated is an arid area and not
used to so much water. This impacts the flora and fauna
and makes the water not suitable for drinking.
Outbreak of diseases – the concern of an increase in malaria
because of the increased reservoirs and water logged
lands, which are prime locations for mosquitoes to breed.
Authorities have suggested pesticides but there is concern
for humans ingesting the pesticide. Another disease on
the rise is TB because of the increasing number of people
being moved out of their villages because of dams. The
shanty towns they move to have no running water and no
plumbing.
There was no social impacts
assessment before the dam
project started. The World
Bank tried to do an
assessment after the dam
project started but found that
there was a ‘severe shortage
in baseline data’.
One of the main problems
that came up was the lack of
communication between the
state and the people who
were to be affected by the
project.
http://www.narmada.org/images/haripics/harikrishna.pictures1.html
 Established in 1989
 Sept 1989 - 60,000 people rally
against destructive
development
 Jan 1990 – 5,000 people
marched on the Narmada
Valley Development authority
offices forcing them to close
 March 1990 – 10,000
protesters blocked the
highway from Bombay for two
days
 May 1990 – 2,000 people
staged a sit-in outside the
prime ministers house in
Delhi
• Christmas Day 1990 – Long March – 3,000 people walked, 100km,
which took a week to the dam site, once they got there Medha Patka
and 6 others went on a hunger strike demanding the government
suspend work on the dam and hold an independent review. It lasted
22 days until they broke fast – this made Narmada an international
issue.
• Jan 1991 – The World Bank commissions independent review

http://www.narmada.org/images/haripics/harikrishna.pictures1.html
Once the world Bank withdrew, the country of India
financed the rest of the Dam themselves.

However, India has already received $250 million from the

World Bank and is “legally obligated towards the Bank to
carry out its obligations under the loan agreement.”
Not enough resettlement sites have been set up
for the amount of people already displaced.

The sites that have been set up have no electricity,

no water, no farming, and no fruit or trees.

In order to get water etc., they must buy them but
they can’t buy them if they can’t farm and they
can’t farm because they don’t have these things
http://www.sardarsarovardam.org/default.htm
The resettlement agency showed the same town
to tribal people who were considering being
relocated. For those that resign to move, will be
taken to a completely different town with no
amenities promised, if there are any houses
available at all.
The other option is to take a cash payment for
what their land is worth, which oftentimes is not
enough to buy other property and goes to food for
survival
They mov e to the
outskirts of the city
where they try to get
work as laborers and live
on less than $1 a day
They go back to their old
town by the river and hope
that their houses have not
been destroyed by police
they protest
One of these villages in the desert region where
millions of people are affected by water shortages is
Gujarat. It is one of the villages bring used by the
government to justify the Narmada dam. Twenty
years ago they relied on their wells, but the wells are
now dry. Why?
Agribusiness and industry are drilling ever deeper
tube wells to find water, which is causing the water
level to decrease by about 4ft every year. Currently,
the town of Gujarat, is dependant on emergency
water supplies from the government
Is This More
Important Than
Rehabillation
Of tribals and
providing water
To Needy
People?
The Sardar Sarovar dam height will be
raised to 110m. This will displace
12,000 families without any
resettlement or displacement program.

Protests are a regular occurrence and

they will continue to do so until the
dam is stopped.

Medha Patkar’s contribution for tribals

Rehabilation can’t be ignored in this
issue.
“Nobody builds Big Dams to provide drinking water to
rural people. Nobody can afford to.”

“There's a lot of money in poverty .”

Awards and Honors

•She was a recipient of Right

Livelihood Award (1991)
•M.A.Thomas National Human
Rights Award (1999)
•Deena Nath Mangeshkar
Award
•Mahatma Phule Award
•Goldman Environment Prize
•Green Ribbon Award
•Human Rights Defender's
Award
Foreign Fund and Anti-National
Activities

•The Madhya Pradesh Government alleged

the “Narmada Bachao Andolan” of
receiving foreign funds and using them for
unclear purposes. They claimed that, the
money that was obtained was being used
by the organization to hamper the
rehabilitation process.
 ‘no-dam’ to ‘dam-OK-if-rehab-OK’. For all these previous
years, she was just opposed to all kinds of concessions.
Her fight against the Narmada project cost the associated
states and people 5-10 years of development.

 She has been seen to be anti-development through long

and uncompromising agitations against economically
gainful projects.

 Once the Narmada project has been completed there is

nothing but praise for it and Medha is nowhere in sight.
 Medha Patkar, her colleagues, the NBA, and the
NAPM, are all symbols of hope. Medha Patkar
conveys this message of hope and solidarity, when she
says, "we have to challenge these forces, conveying to
them that we who resist are not just in nooks and
corners of the world. We are together... But it can't be
just a one-time
demonstration in the street, but continuous
strategizing and action on multiple fronts that can
challenge these forces"
Displacing poor tribal people from their homes and
destroying their means of livelihood without them
having a say and without giving them just
compensation is not development but a human rights
violation.

And that’s why her fight is for cause.

Group 6
Roll No 86 to 90
RIMSR MMS B