A life-giving hill

Vedanta, a diversified mining company, has failed to get a green signal for mining for bauxite in Niyamgiri — the sacred mountain that upholds universal law for the Dongria Kondh, Kutia Kondh and Jharania Kondh tribes.

The tribals have been resisting the mining since Vedanta set up its alumina refinery in Lanjigarh, at the base of Niyamgiri. The objective was always to mine the Niyamgiri bauxite, but seeing the resistance, Sterlite, the earlier avatar of Vedanta, denied any link between the refinery and the mine, and applied to the ministry of forests and environment for an environmental clearance for the refinery. In its application the company provided wrong information to the effect that the refinery would not require forest land, and the refinery started in 2004. The Dongria Kondh and other tribes inhabiting the Niyamgiri forests have been resisting the threat of mining of bauxite and the aluminium refinery in their sacred mountain ever since.
The tribes of Niyamgiri have a prosperous biodiversity economy based on conservation. As a result the area still boasts of more than 300 species of plants, including 112 medicinal plants. The most significant contribution of bauxite hills like Niyamgiri is provision of water. Bauxite helps retain water. One river and 32 streams originate in these bauxite hills. Niyamgiri is thus the exemplar of our rich natural and cultural heritage which PESA (Panchayati Raj Extension to Scheduled Areas Act) and the Forest Rights Act (FRA) are supposed to protect.
Across the country, the mining lobby is violating the Constitution, and the FRA and PESA, and spreading terror and lawlessness.
Two Dongria Kondh leaders from Niyamgiri, Lado Sikaka and Sana Sikaka, were abducted in Niyamgiri while on their way to attend the policy dialogue — Niyamgiri: A test case for the Forest Rights Act — that the Navdanya Trust had organised alongwith the Save Niyamgiri Movement on August 12, 2010, at the Constitution Club in New Delhi. The intention was to get the tribals to communicate directly with experts and parliamentarians.
It is as a result of the violation of the rights of tribals as enshrined in PESA, the FRA and the human rights of tribal communities that the tribals feel alienated. This in turn has contributed to the growth of the Maoist movement in tribal areas. The “green” areas of the forests and tribals are becoming the “red” areas of armed resistance.
In early 2010, the government announced Operation Green Hunt, a violent response to the violence in tribal areas which has grown in response to the violence and terror unleashed by the corporate state in tribal areas to get access to minerals — coal, iron ore, bauxite. In response, Navdanya Trust organised the Independent People’s Tribunal on Land Acquisition, Resource Grab & Operation Green Hunt in New Delhi from April 9-11, 2010, to show that the corporate state was violating the Constitution and laws. This led to public hearings in Jharkhand on May 7-8, 2010, and the conference on Niyamgiri at New Delhi’s Constitution Club on August 12. On August 14, the Saxena Committee submitted its report on Niyamgiri, confirming the violation of laws which led to the government withdrawing the conditional clearance that had been granted to Vedanta. It is a combination of many forces that put pressure on the government to stop the mining in Niyamgiri. While the neo-liberal paradigm was based on the assumption that resources of the poor can be freely grabbed by the corporations in violation of democracy and the Constitution, movements against land grab — from Singur and Nandigram, to Aligarh and Dadri, as well as Posco and Niyamgiri — are creating a political imperative for a shift of economic priorities to respect democratic processes, environmental laws and rights of tribals and farmers. Rahul Gandhi’s entry to support Niyamgiri is indicative of the paradigm shift taking place.
While the shift to democratic protection of the rights of the earth and people has started, it is not complete. Vedanta has already started demanding alternative sites for mining bauxite, including the sacred Gandhamardan Hills.
The Niyamgiri victory needs to re-examine the model where we irreversibly destroy our natural wealth to export steel and aluminium. This is an example of what I have called the “outsourcing of pollution”. Vedanta’s alumina refinery and aluminium smelter are already creating massive pollution. Vedanta is illegally spreading its red mud ponds into villages and forest land in Lanjigarh. Rivers are dying, and with them the communities the rivers support. Felix Padel and Samarendra Das, in their book Out of this Earth, have said each tonne of alumina generates one tonne of waste and needs 250 kilowatt hours of electricity. And smelting one tonne of aluminium consumes 13,500 kilowatt hours of electricity, emitting an average of 13.1 tonnes of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. To produce one tonne of aluminium, 1,300 tonnes of water is consumed. This water is being stolen from the people. Without water there is no life or livelihood. Kalahandi district, where Niyamgiri is located, is one of the worst-hit districts in the country in terms of hunger and starvation deaths. The 30 km-long Upper Indravati Dam has diverted water from the Indravati river to the Hati Tel river through a four km tunnel at Mukhiguda. Vedanta’s Burkhamunda smelter in Jharsuguda is getting water from Hirakud Dam on the Mahanadi. Two-hundred kilometres of Indravati have been killed by the Upper Indravati Dam, and the diversion of water from agriculture to industry has already led to major farmers’ protests. Groundwater level is falling. And double crop land is being converted to single crop land due to decline in availability of irrigation water. Thirdly, the water released by the refinery and smelter is toxic, destroying what remains of the rivers and groundwater. If the destruction of water and biodiversity are internalised, Vedanta is creating a negative economy of death and destruction. This is not development.
A cumulative impact of the entire aluminium production chain is necessary to take the Niyamgiri victory to its full conclusion of building earth democracy and living economies.
Niyamgiri is a victory for “Earth Democracy”, both because it has protected the earth and because it grew as a democratic process from the ground up. Niyamgiri was a test for democracy’s ability to stop corporate misrule and terror. It was a test of humanity’s ability to respect the rights of Mother Earth. We have passed the test in Niyamgiri. It is now necessary to extend this victory to every place where forests and land, tribals and Mother Earth are threatened by the greed of land-grabbing and resource-grabbing corporations.

Dr Vandana Shiva is the executive director of the Navdanya Trust