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dam-l LS: Just. Krishna Iyer in Hindustan Times edit page, July 28,1999.
Development for whom?
(V. R. Krishna Iyer on the Narmada issue)
Long years ago Indians made a tryst with destiny to wipe
off every tear of every
tribal brother and sister because they too are equal
humans. That was a historic
moment of hope.
A semi-centennial of illusion has passed since; but the
adivasis, with each passing
day, face the traumatic portent of mass submersion as the
mercilessly rising
waters of the holy Narmada drown whole habitations and rare
arboreal wealth in the
process of impounding the perennial river!
Why does this Operation Thanatos happen in the land of
Buddha and Gandhi,
constitutional guarantees of protective legal egalite and
right to life, forbidden from
deprivation save by just, fair and reasonable procedure?
Compassion and
humanism are writ into the suprema lex as fundamental
duties.
But yet, the pity of it! Is there no pity sitting in the
Ministry that sees into tribal
grief? Justice has a human heart and ‘development’ a human
face if the
Constitution is not counterfeit. When I wrote a sympathetic
piece in a leading daily
based on fundamental values, there was a rejoinder by the
spokesman for the
Gujarat government. I am grateful to the government for the
courtesy and
responsiveness shown to me. Nevertheless, certain grave
issues remain to be
answered, in the name of Indian humanity.
True, development is a necessity of the Third World. But
development for whom
and why? The bells of the Constitution, from the Preamble
to the Fundamental
Rights and Duties, toll for the millions in misery, the
have-nots in thousands of
hamlets huddled in sub-human conditions. Kulaks and tycoons
and their
aggrandisement cannot, shall not, override the basic needs
of the bitter but
voiceless victims of ‘illth’ (illiteracy, ill-health,
ill-clad homelessness). It is a
question of values — has every human, be he landless, the
same value?
The World Bank, after an independent inquiry, dismissed the
claim of rehabilitation
of the displaced Sarovar ragtag and withdrew its support.
But die-hard vested
interests would not halt. The dam construction passionately
persisted, rose to
dangerous levels, reached the Supreme Court and is pending
before the High
Bench. Justice is what Justices do. But papal infallibility
is not an attribute of the
judiciary. Pragmatism makes its verdict final and if it
goes wrong and afflicts
humble humans in colossal numbers it is final, like other
natural calamities in a
world of unwitting errors, even egregious blunders.
Of course, learned judges will, with impartiality,
intelligence and professional
training, examine the issues involved subject to
sub-conscious forces at work in
every human being which do not pass the judges by. The
great Justice Cardozo of
the United quoted with approval President Roosevelt: “The
decisions of the courts
on economic and social questions depend upon their economic
and social
philosophy”. So the height of the Sarovar dam, decided by
the judges, depend a
wee bit upon the social philosophy of the robed brethren.
Judges are more objective
and immune to extraneous factors than politicians but
because judges are men,
not disembodied spirits, their judgements are inevitably
influenced by their judicial
character and experience. Such ‘bias’ necessarily affects
all judges, as Cardozo,
in his Judicial Process, felicitously cautions.
The Sarovar height will turn, in some measure, on the value
assessment by the
brethren on the bench as between the mass martyrs of
rising, raging, surging
floods and the latifundists with dreams of heavy harvests
and hydro-power-hungry
industrialists. Who are ‘We, the People of India’? Is there
graded inequality and
gross disparity among them? Whose interests invisibly
influence the
sub-conscious of the decision-makers, executive or
judicative? We can only hope
that the humane wisdom of the court helps the right to life
and effective, just
rehabilitation.
The court is the last refuge as the defender of human
rights and must also consider
the development role of rivers and the humanist parameters.
A lofty moral-jural
perspective, where the lowliest human, is of central
concern in the Supreme
Court’s functional focus. Let us trust the judicature for
the nonce. Can we put faith
in the assurances of rehabilitation by the politicians in
power? I hesitate.
The Bargi was among the early dams on the Narmada with
profuse promises of
rehabilitation and planned prosperity. Now, vis-a-vis the
families displaced and
hamlets under water, it is unmitigated sorrow, it is said.
Innocent villagers, after the
turbulent impoundment and submergence, are in distress and
witness to
environmental calamity. Not a soul should be thrown out
until complete restoration
is a reality. The claim of drinking water to Kutch is a
daring bluff, according to
critics. Alternatives to huge dams are feasible, given an
open mind and readiness
to examine and review. Indeed, experts have suggested such
schemes. Good faith
of the governments granted, better projects need not be
rejected.
In the Gandhian vision, Small is Beautiful and Big can be
Barbaric. I stand for no
dogma except the right to life of the least and the last
Indian. Gargantuan or
Gandhian — quo vadis India? For over half of a century we
have believed that big
dams would deliver the people of India from hunger and
poverty. The opposite has
happened. Big dams have pushed the country to the brink of
a political and
ecological emergency. They have uprooted 40 million people,
most of them tribal
and Dalit, from their forests and rivers, from lands and
homes where they and their
ancestors have lived for thousands of years. They have lost
everything.
Everything. It is their children that you see begging on
the streets. It is they and
their children who pay our food and electricity bills. Not
a single big dam in India
has delivered what it promised. Not the power, not the
irrigation, not the flood
control, not the drought-proofing. Instead, big dams have
converted huge tracts of
agricultural land into waterlogged salt wastelands,
submerged hundreds of
thousands of hectares of prime forest, and pushed the
country deep into debt. The
era of big dams is over. All over the world they are being
recognised as
technological disasters. As big mistakes. I plead with the
managers of State
power: do have the charity to give the benefit of doubt.
A final thought, the court in its eclectic wisdom, I feel
confident, will give serious
thought as the sentinel of developmental justice to what I
have spelt out with
reference to that great institution to which I once humbly
belonged.