The NGOs which have been launching an anti-POSCO campaign also asked the government expand the scope of ongoing investigations against A Raja for his role in POSCO clearance and also against all those who were involved in promoting this ‘scandalous’ project.
The said that A Raja may have facilitated POSCO entry as environment minister in 2007 he accorded the first major satatutary clearance by approving captive port component one day before he was shifted to Telecom ministry.
They also asked the Orissa government to immediately withdraw its police operations and forcible acquisition of land for POSCO project. Several imminent people in the country came together in an effort to prevent carnage from taking place and appealed the prime minister to immediately ask Orissa government to halt illegal attack, withdraw all clearance given in violation of law and take an impartial position on the court cases filed by the people.
“Failure to stop this attack will show that the UPA government’s much vaunted concern over issues of displacement, forest rights and inclusive growth is simply an eyewash,” an appeal issues by imminent persons said.
They expressed apprehension that the exigent state police action that is now underway in these villages may result in another Kalinganagar or Nandigram type situation.
A study titled “Tearing through the water landscape: Evaluating the environmental and social consequences of POSCO project in Odisha, India” conducted by Environment Support Group (ESG) said over 13,000 acres is merely the demand of land for realising POSCO’s dream project in India. Thousands of families will be dislocated, and suffer irreparable damage to their lives and livelihoods. The project is the single largest industrial venture conceived in recent past, and that such scale of investment will be done only because India is gifting highly expensive and excellent iron ore for POSCO to make stupendous profits. There is absolutely no benefit for India in this deal, and what POSCO will leave behind, if they succeed at all, is a lot of fly ash, destroyed ecologically sensitive coastal and forest environments and thousands in misery.
This study was undertaken at the request of POSCO Pratirodh sangram samiti. it reveals environment minister has become today become the architect of one of India’s greatest planned disasters that begins its ominous initiative by turning the affected communities into a right less people as their fundamental rights have been snatched away on the basis of faith and trust in Odisha government’s lies.
The NGOs which raised the issue include ESG Bangalore, Campaign For Survival Of Dignity National Forum Of Forest People And Forest Worker (NFFPFW) All India Progressive Women Association (AIPWA) , Delhi Solidarity Group, All India Student Association and others.