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>By Ranjit Dev Raj
>NEW DELHI, Sep 19 (IPS) - Police have arrested hundreds of anti- dam
>protesters to stop them drowning in the
>Narmada river, reported rising rapidly Sunday following heavy rains and
>the opening floodgates at the Bargi and Tawa dams.
>
>The arrested included Medha Patkar of the Narmada Bachao Andolan
>(Save the Narmada Movement) currently leading a
>suicidal 'Jal Samarpan' (offering to the waters) campaign - a last ditch
>effort to stop construction of the huge Narmada Valley Project.
>
>Patkar was arrested at Pipalchop village in western Maharashtra state
>where the house in which she and other protesters
>threatened to drown in was submerged. But the flooding was reported
>worse in central Madhya Pradesh state.
>
>Ajay Tirkey, chief executive of Hoshangabad, the worst affected district
>in Madhya Pradesh told the United News of India (UNI)
>news agency he expected the Narmada, already flowing 12 feet over the
>danger mark to rise another two feet Sunday night.
>
>Helicopter-borne rescue teams failed to persuade residents of some sixty
>villages to move to safer ground despite many of them
>having to climb trees as the waters swirled through their homes, UNI reported.
>
>Tirkey told the agency that some 10,000 food packets were air-dropped
>in the worst affected areas of the district and that 'any
>means' would be used to shift the endangered people.
>
>According to NBA spokesperson, Madhu Gopalan, flood waters from the
>Sardar Sarovar Project, to build the biggest of a series
>of dams in the Narmada valley were lapping at buildings in Jalsindhi and
>Domkhedi villages housing activists and village representatives.
>
>''The people protesting against the unjust submergence and displacement
>in Jalsindhi and Domkhedi have reiterated their resolve
>not to move out even if they were submerged,'' Gopalan said.
>
>The height of the Sardar Sarovar Dam was raised by eight metres after
>the Supreme Court lifted February a four-year ban on
>construction widening the reservoir and allowing submergence of a vast
>areas in Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat
>states.
>
>In all, the mega-project is expected by NBA to displace 40,000 tribal
>families in the three states according to NBA activities
>although most of them are yet to be resettled satisfactorily.
>
>Despite a high-profile campaign on behalf of the tribals by intellectuals
>such as the Booker prize winning author Arundhati Roy, the
>central government has chosen not to intervene and let the rising flood
>waters settle the issue. (END/IPS/rdr/99)
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Date: Mon, 20 Sep 1999 12:39:03 -0800
From: Himanshu Thakkar <cwaterp@del3.vsnl.net.in> (by way of Patrick
McCully)
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Subject: LS: IPS - Narmada Dam Oustees Defy Floods and Police
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