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*Torpa looks at a second chance, but tensions simmer*
ArcelorMittal's steel plant is awaited with hope. Torpa is looking for
a second chance to migrate from a poor village to a modern urban cluster but
tension is building between those who want development and those against it.
For two decades, National Hydel Power Corporation (NHPC) proposed, and
some local tribal groups opposed, the setting up of the Koel-Karo
hydro-electric project there, and it was finally abandoned last year. Today,
the pro-developers are looking forward to ArcelorMittal?s proposed
12-million-tonne steel plant to transform what can best be described as a
struggling hamlet. Arraigned against them are some tribal groups,
organised under a religious community who see the inevitable acquisition of
land and the steel plant as a process that will change the face of Torpa for
worse. Locals say that part of one village will be displaced to make way
for the plant though the actual plant site has not been indicated yet. In
any case, much of the area is already devastated by sand mining and
brickfields. The Koel-Karo project involved the construction of a dam
ahead of the confluence of the Koel and Karo rivers. This would have created
a huge lake for drawing water for year-round cultivation, generated 710 Mw
of power and prevented flash floods common in this hilly area. It would
have required up to 50,000 acres of land (depending on the depth of the
reservoir) and displaced three villages and around 1,500 people.
When abandoned, 239 acres had been acquired. This displaced 169 people and
their nominees were employed at the project site first. After the project
was shelved, they were shifted to other NHPC projects.
If it had come up, the project would have provided direct employment to
10,000 people and indirect employment to 50,000.
?It was a huge shock for us and we were condemned to live in a village.
Torpa would have become a town,? said a top officer at the block
headquarters in charge of the revenue department.
The Koel Karo project ultimately came to be dropped because of strident
opposition by the Torpa sitting MLA Koche Munda of the BJP. Munda?s
supporters said it was because the people felt the reservoir would help
people downstream and not them. Koche Munda could not be contacted for his
response.
In February 2001, police firing on a crowd protesting the Koel Karo project
resulted in the death of eight people, including a policeman.
The opposition then was led by N E Horo, former MP and former minister of
undivided Bihar and president of the Jharkhand Party. His Jharkhand Party
has renewed the struggle against the land acquisition and will be staging
protest meetings at Torpa against the Mittal steel project, he said.
Proponents of development ? and this includes several locals ? point out
that the area has no irrigation and manages to raise one crop dependent on
the monsoon. Locals are forced to migrate for the rest of the year to
subsist.
Locals say tribals here have to fetch drinking water from the river miles
away, live with prolonged power cuts even if they can afford a power line,
and survive as migrant unskilled labourers elsewhere for six months.
?This so-called noble life is being preserved by the opposition,? the locals
complained.
?The tribal lifestyle is mere subsistence because nothing grows here and
this subsistence is being maintained to serve the interests of some who fool
gullible local people,? the revenue department official alleged.
This sentiment was echoed by Satish Sharma, a local who also ran the local
phone booth and camera and photography shop rolled into one. He pointed out
that a steel plant in the area will require literate people, but the
presence of several local schools, meant such resources were available.
Those who are opposing the plant are doing so because we all realise that
the focus of local life will shift from the religious congregation to the
factory and the trade unions,? he said.
Everyone in the shops and in the shacks selling rudimentary food and sweets
grumbled about the brand of the congregation-led opposition politics that
had blocked development in the area over the years.
Evidently, the optimism of Sharma is not universal. This resentment could
well grow into a conflict unless steps were taken to reach a solution, in
the way such divisions have led to communal violence in neighbouring states
like Orissa, they admit.
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