Coal Development Makes the Poorest Even Poorer: Amnesty Intl

A new report shows that coal mining is forcing communities off their land, and leaving them with nothing.

Nirupabai, a Kawar Adivasi woman, has lost everything to the Kusmunda mine. (Photo courtesy: Amnesty International)

In the name of development, Coal India allegedly stripped local tribals in Kusmunda, Chhattisgarh of their ancestral land in February 2014, without proper compensation. But this is isn’t an one-off case.

The central government has plans to double coal production by 2020. Coal development is part of the government’s scheme to bring electricity to the hundreds of millions of people in the country living without power.

But this comes at a cost for tribal communities in Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Odissa, according to a new report from Amnesty International India.

Communities have been forced off their land to make way for major mining operations with no prior consent and without adequate compensation, the report found during interviews with 124 Adivasi tribal people.

These actions are a violation of human rights, activists say.

Development that does not include the Adivasi and that leaves out the poorest of thepoor is not development, but exploitation.

V Kishore Chandra Deo, Former Union Minister of Tribal Affairs