The Singrauli region, in central India, is a nerve centre for thermal power and is called the ‘energy capital’ of India. An area of over 3,000 sq km, spread across the borders of UP and MP, has been demarcated for thermal power production. Of the six super thermal power projects in the region, three are owned and operated by the NTPC. Acquisition of land for the Singrauli Super Thermal Power Project (SSTPP) began in 1977. Rihand Super Thermal Power Project (RhSTPP) acquired land in 1982. At about the same time, the acquisition process started for the Vindhyachal Super Thermal Power Project (VSTPP). The first two are located in Dudhi tehsil of Sonbhadra district (at that time Mirzapur) of UP. VSTPP is in Waidha tehsil of the neighbouring Singrauli district of MP. All these projects draw water from the reservoir created by the Rihand dam in 1960.

A majority of people affected by the NTPC projects were relocated when their houses and fields were submerged by the Rihand reservoir in 1960. In the absence of proper rehabilitation, a significant number of the oustees were settled near and around the shores of the reservoir. Little did they know that they would be faced with another episode of displacement. The holocaust of the first displacement, etched forever in the memories of that generation as a nightmare, was nevertheless different in one respect from the displacement due to the coal-fired power projects. In spite of the trauma experienced then and the long and painful years of hard work, most people somehow felled forests for survival and started life anew. Land in the 1960s was not scarce. However, in the second round of displacement, the people were thrown completely at the mercy of an impersonalised state agency. Forest laws had become stricter, and it became even more difficult to settle on forest land.

Life before the Power Project

People in the Singrauli region were predominantly adivasis even though they had not been categorised as Scheduled Tribes in UP. For example, whereas the Gonds in MP were categorised as Scheduled Tribes, their counterparts in UP were Scheduled Castes. Primarily agriculturists, their dependence on forests was critical for their survival. The forests were an important source of fuel, fodder, food, timber and medicines. The collection of minor forest produce such as mahua, chiraunji, tendu and lac allowed them to earn some money seasonally. The forests in this region abounded in numerous species of trees, each having multiple uses in the lives of the people. In times of famine, forests provided food security. Maize, wheat, paddy and coarse grains such as kodo, sawa and, mijhri were the main cereals of in this region. Achar, matar, masuri, urad and edible oils such as til and linseed were also locally grown. People grew almost everything they needed. Agriculture was the mainstay, with cattle forming the backbone of the local economy. Though land holdings were not large, the people could, nevertheless, by sheer hard work and industry, produce enough for the family`s consumption. The surplus was sold locally to buy necessities such as salt and kerosene. Almost every family owned milch and other cattle and there was plenty of milk.

Ranu Narayan of village Mitihini in Dudhi Tehsil recollects that in his childhood he had not witnessed scarcity of milk. Even after the 1960 submergence, there was such abundance of milk that ghee as a by-product was routinely sold in Renusagar market. Sarunissa was very young when the NTPC acquired land for VSTPP. Yet, she vividly remembers the abundance of vegetables in her village, Jaitpur. Artisans and other service class got paid in kind, which included land. Before the entry of the NTPC, people were more or less independent of the market economy and their lives after the first displacement continued to be under their control.

Post-NTPC Scenario

NTPC is one of the largest borrowers of World Bank money. Therefore, its relocation and rehabilitation policy should have been in conformity with World Bank policy guidelines. These guidelines expect the borrower to involve local communities in making decisions affecting their lives, minimise involuntary resettlement by exploring least displacement alternatives and include land-for-land as an option for rehabilitation such that people after displacement stand a fair chance of their lives being restored to pre-displacement levels.

The NTPC relocation and rehabilitation policy and practice in all three projects violated these guidelines consistently and repeatedly. Neither the borrower nor the lender showed any concern for rehabilitating the affected communities as an integral part of project planning and costing. Whereas meticulous and minute plans were laid for ensuring timely commissioning of the power plants and the related infrastructure, no thought was given to the question of how the people affected by the project would be rehabilitated or resettled. A World Bank Staff Appraisal Report for the first NTPC power project, that is, SSTPP, noted that there would be no need for any resettlement site because all the oustees would be given jobs and then accommodated in the township of NTPC. This clearly shows that NTPC had no plan for resettlement. People affected by the first NTPC project were dumped on a barren, undulated site in Chikadand village in 1977. All that the people had was a 30 x 50 ft residential plot each.

Somehow, people weathered this shattering experience and put together their lives. However, in about 10 years, they were stunned to discover that the resettlement site had been handed over to the Northern Coalfields Limited (NCL). People refused to move and NCL gave up the site but carried on its activities on the edge of the resettlement colony. As a result, the resettlement site stands today at the base of an overburdened dump from Khadia Coalmine, sandwiched between the coal handling plant and the railway line. Many houses bear cracks because of the vibrations caused by blasting. The resettlement sites in subsequent years are also in greatly disadvantaged locations. In fact, the awful locations of the resettlement sites provoked a World Bank Environmental Impact study to remark that the sites for resettlement colonies are no better than sites for garbage dumps (`Socio-Economics in Environmental Impact Study`, Ch. 3, conducted by Electrictrite de France, 1989-90). Resettlement colonies in all the three NTPC projects lack basic amenities such as water, drainage and toilets. Contrary to the promises made, the resettlement sites present a picture of continuous neglect. Furthermore, the NTPC has transferred its liability of maintenance of resettlement sites to Special Area Development Authority (SADA) in UP, despite the utterly bad experience of the handling of such responsibility by SADA in MP, and without the knowledge of the people.

When the people were displaced, a sufficient number of plots to accommodate the oustees had not been made ready. The NTPC in Rihand took possession of four villages, namely, Bijpur, Dodhar, Sirsoti and Adhaura. Only one colony had been earmarked for resettlement. This was hardly enough to accommodate even the oustees of Bijpur village. People from the remaining villages were forced to fend for themselves. When resettlement sites for Dodhar and Sirsoti were earmarked in the early 90s, most of the oustees were unable to take advantage because they had no money left to construct new dwellings. Even today, very few families have occupied the plots allotted to them in Dodhar and Sirsoti.

Separated from the NTPC township by barbed boundary walls, the resettlement colonies are a contrast to the townships. Brightly lit townships with wide roads, well-built houses, prestigious public schools, recreation centres, shopping complexes, sprawling lawns and parks, hospitals and places of worship, NTPC colonies were planned and built, well in advance, for NTPC personnel and in synchronisation with the commissioning of the power plants. In the name of security, the entrances to the NTPC townships are manned by armed CISF personnel empowered to prevent the entry of ‘unwarranted’ persons.

Monetary Compensation

Assets such as land, homestead, trees and wells were greatly undervalued and compensation rates for land were calculated on the basis of the average rates of land registered in government records in three years preceding the acquisition. This average did not reflect the actual value of land because prices were under-quoted to escape paying high duty on the purchases. The amounts received enabled the people to replace only up to 30 per cent of their lost assets.

Although lands were acquired all at once, evictions were carried out at different points of time. Thus, for instance, the first round of evictions was for the power projects, townships and its associated infrastructure. In this round, the people involved were categorised subsequently as Stage I in the NTPC’s Resettlement and Rehabilitation Policy. The second round of evictions was for the construction of permanent ash dykes and this took place in the late 90s. The compensation amount, disbursed many years prior to the evictions, got spent by the people much before they had to move.

Part of the Singrauli region falling in UP was unsurveyed area and no proper and authentic land records existed. Large chunks of land had been transferred to the forest department for management, pending demarcation as forest and reserve land. People had been in occupation of these lands for generations, and yet they did not have their names on the land records. At the intervention of the Supreme Court in the matter of Banwasi Sewa Ashram vs State of UP, the Kaimur Survey Settlement Agency was set up to settle the rights of the people. However, massive corruption in the functioning of the Agency ensured that the land records continued to be in a mess. The payment of bogus compensation was rampant. Jhilo, Khamaria and Parvatwa villages, acquired by RhSTPP for the expansion of ash dyke, are classic examples of false land records. The people were in occupation but the land, in many cases, was entered in the names of people, who did not belong to the village but who belonged to places as far away as Ghazipur or other parts of UP. These people had links and knowledge about the acquisition and had got the land recorded in their names, using influence. Compensation amounts have not been disbursed fully even to this day. Many disputes are pending in the local courts, long after people have been displaced. Man villagers have given up the pursuit of such claims for want of money to pay the lawyers. Some others have died.

Rehabilitation

At the time of taking possession, permanent class IV category jobs were promised to all. However, only one-third of the displaced people were actually given jobs. There was no written and publicly declared policy document in the 80s, during the initial round of displacement. Those who were provided jobs included the politically and economically powerful, or those who resorted to use of muscle power. For example, Ram Jatan Jaiswal, Sarpanch of Dodhar village, and his family were disproportionately benefited because of their cooperation with the NTPC in evicting people. There are many families to whom not a single permanent job has been provided. Most of these people have to struggle for even contract labour casual employment.

Every power project acquired fertile, level fields instead of barren land, with a view to minimise investment cost and maximise profit. The World Bank study in its report assessed the impact as severe when it concluded that even 10 power projects together cannot provide as many jobs as the land on which people depend.

Why did the NTPC not provide permanent jobs to all affected persons? The answer provided is that there were not so many jobs and that people were not adequately trained. Both these arguments are myths as every power project has at least 1,000 jobs of a perennial nature, which have been given out on contract. These include maintenance, both of the power plant and the township, and housekeeping in the power plant. The skills required for these are very basic, which the locals could easily master. But, if they were employed, the profit margin of the NTPC would diminish greatly. It is also not the true that the locals were not qualified for technical jobs. There are many instances of people, such as Lakhpat Viswakarma of Judi village affected by the ash dyke of VSTPP, who were qualified enough but lacked the influence! Even if the claim that the people were not qualified is allowed, NTPC had the responsibility of making sure that, during the gestation period of at least five years before the project was commissioned, the locals acquired the necessary qualifications and received training for the jobs in the project. Whatever jobs were given were given during the earlier phase, and by the time people in the later round of displacement were to be moved, NTPC flatly refused to give permanent jobs. Stiff resistance by people in ash dyke-affected villages and the worldwide criticism of social and environmental impacts of world bank investments in Singrauli compelled the Bank to advise NTPC to frame a rehabilitation policy. The first such policy with land for land as option was framed in 1993 as a condition of a further 1.2 billion loan for restructuring of the power sector to minimise the role of state therein. This policy was made in haste and as the events unfolded, it proved to be a farce. The policy, in any case, was to be implemented only in prospective displacement and not to those already displaced, even though their rehabilitation was a known failure. However, even for prospective displacement, the evictions from ash dyke villages, the policy was a non starter. Full of platitudes, the policy was silent on the mechanisms of translating the goal into practice. The practice was proved to be a repetition of the past—paramilitary forces were deployed in 1995 in Mitihini village. Those who resisted were sent to jail and their standing crops were bulldozed. People were demanding permanent jobs or five acres land to each adult. The NTPC was willing to give neither. The resistance continued for four years. Ultimately, because of a claim filed by few families of Mitihini with World Bank inspection panel, people were given enhanced compensation to enable them to buy land. The package appeared to be the best that the people could expect, given their very weak bargaining power. Once again the package did not apply the concept of replacement value to the landless.

For the unrehabilitated oustees of the first phase, the policy only had the option of income generating projects. These ventures in part were a proven failure. For example, Rajnarain Panika of Bijpur (Rihand) village was given an auto on loan to ferry passengers from the boat to the NTPC Bijpur gate. For as long as the boat service continued, Panika was able to pay his installments to the Bank. As soon as the road connecting Bijpur to Waidhan was ready, the boat service ended, and with it Panika’s source of earning. Similarly, Radhay of Bijpur was provided financial support to run a poultry farm. After years of running it successfully, the NTPC Rihand closed his shop on false pretexts. A dairy project, started with great fanfare, was closed because of its unviability! Not a single income-generating venture is operational at present. The oustees are forced to offer their labour to contractors. If they are lucky, they may get work. They must remain content with 20 days of work in a month. Contractors normally prefer non-oustees and labour from the outside because they are ready to work for less than the minimum wage. The reliance on the contract system for perennial jobs accounts for the huge profits earned by the NTPC year after year. Thus, whereas land and forest resources were a source of permanent sustenance for the ousted villagers, the alternatives offered by the NTPC are casual, uncertain and temporary in nature.

A Pattern of Exploitation

The NTPC projects exhibit a typical pattern, insofar as rehabilitation is concerned. Self-reliant subsistence economies have been forcibly destroyed, crippling the people’s capacity to control their own lives forever. In exchange for land and land-related livelihoods, people have been forced to live a life of uncertainty and impoverishment. Land, air and water resources have been destroyed, and forests placed out of bounds. Robbed of their natural support systems, people are now more or less at the mercy of the NTPC. When people protest, petty contracts are used as a means to buy off the leaders. Social and environmental costs are not accounted for as these are easiest to ignore. People are illiterate, gullible and unorganised. The condition of the oustees continues to be appalling and their problems remain unaddressed. Local newspapers are replete with news about agitations by displaced communities. Living in the shadow of glittering NTPC townships, their own lives and future remain dark.

Madhu Kohli is a Social Activist working in Sonbhadra region, Uttar Pradesh.