UPA pushing PCPIR, power projects to AP: Patkar

Visakhapatnam: The Congress-led UPA government is pushing the Coastal Industrial Corridor, Petroleum, Chemicals and Petro-Chemical Investment Region (PCPIR), nuclear and thermal power plants to Andhra Pradesh at the cost of people to benefit corporate sector and this would destroy land and livelihood of fisherfolk, small and marginal farmers, said Narmada Bachao Andolan leader and convenor of National Alliance of People’s Movements (NAPM) Medha Patkar.

Ms Patkar, after interacting with the residents of Kovvada and surrounding villages of Ranasthalam mandal in Srikakulam district where a nuclear power plant was proposed, told reporters here on Wednesday that the villagers were vehemently opposing the nuclear power plant as they would be prone to a destructive technology and the project would have an adverse effect on their health and livelihood.

She found fault with the government officials for cancelling the scheduled public hearing at Kovvada to receive objections from the villagers whose lands were to be acquired for the project, in the guise of cyclone ‘Leher’. She condemned the preventive arrests of representatives of various NGOs. “A large part of the PCPIR spread over 603 sq. km from Visakhapatnam to Kakinada will fill the fertile coastal region with highly polluting chemical, petro-chemical, pharma industries and thermal power projects,” she pointed out.

Ms Patkar said nearly 2.5 crore people, comprising fisherfolk, small and marginal farmers, Dalit farm labourers and Adivasis, would be displaced and their livelihood would be destroyed in the process. “This has already happened in some parts like Tada Special Economic Zone (SEZ), Krishnapatnam Port and Paravada Pharma City,” she said.

The Narmada Bachao Andolan leader said the UPA government was replacing the colonial Land Acquisition Act, 1894, and a new Act titled ‘Right to Fair Compensation, Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013’ had been enacted, which would come into effect from January 2014. She alleged that the new Act would neither end the land conflicts nor provide relief to those displaced as it was too weak in addressing issues.