 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|||||||||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
||||||
Solidarity Trip to Another World (4 of 6)
GRASSROOTS GLOBAL JUSTICE SOLIDARITY TRIP TO NAGPUR & AURANGBAD
The GGJ trip was an extraordinary opportunity to connect with other people at a grassroots, community level – often when we do connect with people around the world, it’s with other people at large national or international NGOs. Unfortunately, it’s still so very little time to figure out how to work together. It’s a challenge to figure out what we can do for the people from here. Is it enough to continue fighting US foreign policy, US multinationals, and the large international institutions (like the World Bank/IMF), but using our experience with the people of India to inform and motivate the campaigns?
22.Jan.04 A Village’s Story of Displacement -- The Gosikhurd Dam Project, near Nagpur, India
“No Rehabilitation, No Dam!” was the slogan chanted by those who organized against the building of the Gosikhurd Dam Project, including our guide – activist Vilas Bhongade. Bhongade takes those of us who have stayed in India to go on a solidarity trip with members of the Grassroots Global Justice delegation to see an inspiring example of a victory in a worldwide struggle against development-related displacement. (Other well-known examples are the Narmada Valley in India, the Three Gorges Dam in China, and countless cases of unjust evictions and displacement, similar to what’s happened to Chinatowns in NYC, SF, Oakland, Boston, etc…).
From the top of the half-finished dam project, Vilas points out some of the villages across the water saved from displacement. A group of fishermen waving hello below are from some of the 200 villages that would have been affected.
We drive on bumpy roads to a village where we are greeted with home-cooked food, genuine hospitality, curious children, mountains of red chile peppers drying on rooftops. These villagers were part of the big Gosikhurd Dam protest -- but paid for it when the government cut off all their basic services. For over two years, the villagers have been fighting for electricity, clean drinking water and road maintenance. The local government agreed to take money from the World Bank, but never used it for the benefit of the community. We ask how we can support them, and the villagers respond that activists in Northern countries could help put pressure on the Indian government to respond to their needs and pressure on the World Bank to provide funding for projects that will actually help them, not just the Indian government and corporate elites.
During the World Social Forum the week before, we met Pa Thik, a Thai farmer from a displaced family, who started organizing with the Assembly of the Poor. After much intense pressure from the grassroots up, the World Bank had agreed to research the effects of the large dam it had funded. It finally concluded that it had made a mistake and would use the information to inform their future projects, but did nothing for Pa Thik and the other peoples they had already displaced. The people who run the World Bank and these huge investment businesses are not naïve to the inhumane effects their development projects have on communities – examples like these lead many of us to believe that the World Bank, the IMF and corrupt governments cannot be pressured into conscience, but must be taken apart altogether, and power returned to the hands and hearts of the people.
