Kerala <http://www.hindu.com/2008/02/06/25hdline.htm> - Pathanamthitta [image: Printer Friendly Page]<http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/thscrip/print.pl?file=2008020656020300.htm&date=2008/02/06/&prd=th&;>
http://www.hindu.com/2008/02/06/stories/2008020656020300.htm [image: Send this Article to a Friend]<http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/thscrip/pgemail.pl?date=2008/02/06/&prd=th&;> * Estate encroachment gaining strength * Staff Reporter * Threats of self-immolation after arrest of encroacher * * GATHERING STRENGTH: A gathering of encroachers attached to the Sadhu Jana Vimochana Samyukta Vedi at the Kumbazha Estate at Chengara, near Konni, during a visit by Yogendra Parikh, social activist, on Tuesday. * PATHANAMTHITTA: The six-month-old encroachment of the Kumbazha Estate of Harrissons Malayalam Limited at Chengara, near Konni, by the Sadhu Jana Vimochana Samyukta Vedi (SJVSV) workers, which they term the 'Chengara land struggle,' is gaining momentum with more social organisations extending support to it over the past few months. An attempt made by the police to arrest an encroacher taking bath in a stream passing through the estate led to increased tension at Chengara for a few hours on Tuesday. According to reports received here on Tuesday afternoon, the SJVSV activists, especially women, protested against the police action by threatening self-immolation if the police failed to set free the vedi worker in custody. Tension prevailed at the estate till 1 p.m. and the police had to later retreat from the scene. However, five persons owing allegiance to SJVSV Ravikumar, Raju, Ramachandran, Ravi and Nanu were arrested by the police from outside the estate boundary later in the afternoon. As many as 6,000 acres of land have been encroached by the vedi activists who have pitched not less than 2,500 tents in the occupied area. Meanwhile, the CPI (ML), Dalit Panthers, C.K. Janu's Adivasi Gothra Maha Sabha, Nationalist Congress Party, Bharatiya Janata Party, People's Democratic Party and many others have extended support to the agitation. Certain progressive outfits in the region even succeeded in bringing social activists such as Arundhati Roy and Medha Patkar to the encroachers during the past three months. Ms. Medha and Ms. Roy compared the agitation to that in Nandigram in West Bengal and the former even warned of joining the land struggle if the government failed to redress the grievances of the agitators in a time-bound manner. Another social activist from north India, Yogendra Parikh, too visited the vedi workers at Chengara and expressed solidarity with them on Tuesday. About 1,200 vedi workers, many of them women, encroached on the private plantation in the wee hours of August 5, 2007, demanding five acres of arable land and Rs.50,000 for each landless family. The encroachers pitched about 150 tents on the rubber plantation in the first few days. The number of tents rapidly went up in the next few weeks. According to SJVSV president Laha Gopalan, the encroachers were landless poor people belonging to all sections of society and the agitation was for the land promised to them by the government. He claimed that Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan had given a written assurance to the vedi leaders at a meeting held in Thiruvananthapuram on September 27, 2006, that land would be allotted to the maximum possible landless families by December 31, 2006, and to the remaining families as per the list provided by the Vedi, by August 1, 2007. Mr. Gopalan claimed that not fewer than 10,000 landless families were camping at the Kumbazha Estate. The vedi workers had also threatened self-immolation if the police tried to forcibly evict them at any point of time. --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Green Youth Movement" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/greenyouth?hl=en-GB -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
