Odisha has a natural advantage of foremost deposits of strategic major mineral resources such as coal, bauxite, chromite and iron ore etc. It has 98 per cent of chrome ore, 60per cent of bauxite and almost one third of coal and iron ore of the total deposits of the country. The State can be country’s aluminium capital, thermal power hub and south Asia’s steel hub by utilising the investments in the sector. But how the business can meet the interest of the people of the State, especially the people in mineral bearing areas, needs to be focused.
Mineral is a natural resource and its best utilisation should meet the best interest of the people. It has been observed that the way the State Government has been involved in mineral business in the name of growth and development, it is not looking at the issue with the similar interest of the mineral bearing areas and the affected people who have been least benefited out of the business. In this context, the implications of District Mineral Foundation (DMF) created under the provisions of Mines and Mineral Development and Regulation Amendment Act 2015 and the Rules framed by the State Government is a matter of concern because the DMF is one of the major sources of financial resources generated out of mineral royalty meant for the mineral bearing area and people. While the State has been struggling with paucity of financial resources for development works, this provision of DMF created under the provision of law has generated hope of regular resource availability.
The mineral bearing areas are the backward areas and home to mostly the marginalized sections. It is observed that the State Government has been delaying implementation of the provisions of DMF under MMDR amendment Act and not covering all the districts because there has been focus on few major mineral bearing districts and not including other major and minor mineral bearing districts. It is violation of the provisions and also depriving other districts of their right to development.
The formation of the DMF shows bias towards bureaucrats by relying more on them. The affected people and mostly the marginalized sections’ representatives have not been taken into confidence and there is no social diversity in the committee without special provision of inclusion of women, SCs and STs as per their proportion. The Government is not involving local people in planning and decision making and execution process by building awareness among local people on various provisions of DMF. It is fact that the whole concept of DMF has not been widely discussed among the people in mineral bearing districts and locally.
The Government has not been maintaining any transparency in allocation of financial resources and no procedure has been followed to address the issues of most disadvantaged area and social groups and priorities of the people who deserve the most. The sustainability of the work is not being discussed locally as local people are always seen as backward even in the decision making process.
These issues were discussed in a two-day dialogue of mining affected communities on development of mineral bearing areas and DFM held at Jamunali in Angul district with gathering of community leaders, activists and environmentalists and people’s leaders from mining affected areas of Jharasuguda, Sukinda, Joda-Barbil, Sundaragarh etc. where Sreedhar of Environics Trust, New Delhi shared that the DMF rules of the State of Jharakhand are comparatively much better than other States in terms of composition of the committee and power to Gram Sabha. Smitarani Pattanik of Nari Surakshya Samiti said the involvement of women in DMF is required to address the emerging issues of domestic violence, unwed mother and many forms of violence against women. She said the elected women representatives of Panchayatiraj institutions are not aware of the provisions of DMF in Angul. So it will affect its implementation. Sumitra Pere from Remenda, lakhanpur, Jharasuguda coal mining area and Saraswati Majhi from Joda, Keonjhar complained that the socio-economic and environmental issues have been left unaddressed by the Government. Maguni Jena from Sukinda, Jajpur shared about the experiences of Dalit and Adivasi communities in Kalinganagar and Sukinda chrome valley area. He said still many of the SCs and STs are staying over Government land without record of rights and they are not getting adequate benefit to rehabilitate them. He said people do not have adequate safe drinking water but mining and industry units in Sukinda valley are polluting the water source and the water table has gone down.
Basanta Pradhan, representing Machakuta Vistapita Sangha in Chhedipada block of Angul district while was critical about the rehabilitation policy of the Government, said the land owners are not getting adequate compensation to rehabilitate them in the changing condition as the land price in coal mining areas is going high with increasing mining business. Sudhir Pradhan, a youth leader and environmental activist from Kishorenagar, Angul, asked in spite of mining and industry why still the people in Angul are poor.
The Nalco, MCl, and NTPC are not contributing much to the development of the local people in Angul district. The plan of the Government to go for more coal based power plants in central-west Odisha will have catastrophic impact. Sisir Tripathy, social activist from Angul, raised the issues of pollution due to coal and fly ash affecting the life of local people with increasing pollution of water, air and land. The local river Brahmani and Nandira are utterly polluted and there has been no action to control the pollution. The mining and industrial pollution has impacted the local agriculture and forest resources and affected the livelihood of the people around mines who are mostly the farming community, said Ranjit Pattnaik , social activist from Angul.
Many participants of the dialogue raised the issues of drinking water and sanitation. It is told that the Swacha Bharat scheme will not be successful without sorting out water crisis. The recent plan of the Government for housing projects is a welcome step but there are households without record of rights over land. So how the landless people are going to avail the housing scheme without homestead land, questioned many.
The Government must give equal amount of attention to counter the destructive impact of mining and industrialization over the people in the area and its environment and eco system. The DMF should be used as an opportunity for creative, sustainable and inclusive growth of the State.
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