A discussion on People’s Movement Critique of Kerala Model Development was held as part of the Vibgyor Documentary film festival. The discussion panel included leaders representing various peoples’ movements, struggles, political campaigns, and alternative movements in Kerala.
Starting the discussion, moderator Geo Jose said Kerala model development is a well- discussed and recommended model of development. But the state’s ecosystem, which is considered as most vulnerable and fragile, is not at all included in any discussion about development or economy. He also raised doubts about how long our Kerala model development would exist, because our economy is heavily based on funds from outside
The discussion panel included T.S George, representing Chakkumkandam Struggle, Anil (Kadikkudam strike), Dr.Vijayan ( Health), (Mavoor Ryons Strike), Sumesh Mangalasseril (Tourism), T.Peter (Coastal Area Development), Mohandas (Athirappally Struggle), Varghese (Agriculture).
Introducing the Chakkumkandam Struggle TS George said Chakkumkandam, near the famous pilgrimage centre Guruvayoor, is a victim of spiritual tourism. There is a large number of hotels and lodges in Guruvayoor, but the majority don’t have septic tanks and proper sanitation facilities. Drainage from these places gets flushed into a canal flowing through the town and it finally reaches a lake. The lake is part of Thrissur kol padam, an ecologically fragile area of fields marked as the CRZ.
Pollution deprives thousands of people depending on the river of their livelihood, but the Guruvayoor Municipality does not take any action against this pollution. This kind of development is nothing but a criminal offence. The waste from the toilet should be scientifically managed.
Anil representing Kadikkudam campaign said Kadikkudam, which is located in the border of Thrissur was not famous earlier and it’s natives were not at all interested in any kind of strikes or campaign and they were living peacefully until Nita Jelatin, a Japanese joint venture, started functioning there. The company uses 130 tonnes of animal bones, litres of hydrochloric acid and two crore litres of water from the Chalakkudi river each day as their raw material.
The company management suppressed all small strikes against the company, but the people started the campaign with strong legal evidence against the company. With the support of RTI act they managed to get more than 1200 documents against the company who has not been given any permission to ooze out that much amount of water from the Chalakkudi river. But the government openly supports the company and considers the struggle as an illegal action. Today there are more than twenty five police cases against Anil he started the campaign. It is sad that the campaign does not get much popular support because lack of public support will be a great issue in our society.
Mohandas who represents Athirappalli campaign said when they started the campaign against the Athirappalli hydro - electric project they were asked whether they wanted electricity there. “We are not opposing any kind of development here but we are asking for a development model which does not exploit our ecological system.” At least for 20 years Keralam should announce monotorium development.
Geo: Kerala’s development model is being considered as a model of development taking the standard of living, literacy statistics, etc into consideration. But if we take each one separately, the facts are not that much satisfactory.
Next Dr.Vijayan spoke of health .
Dr.Vijayan (Body Tree) said Body Tree is an alternative health programme, started seven years before. We have now started a new project One Day School based on the tribal treatment method. We are promoting this as a movement and not as an alternative method. More than 400 of the diseases we are suffering are due to wrong breathing habits. Excess volume of air will break the equilibrium of carbon dioxide and oxygen in our body and that will affect the whole system.
Abdul Rahiman Saheb representing Mavoor Ryons Strike, which is considered as the first of such public campaigns that became successful, said Mavoor Gwaliyor Rayons offered 3000 jobs to public and the government had given them Nilambur forest for free of cost to cultivate bamboo, a raw material of their product. But the company sold all the trees and cultivated eucalyptus trees in its stead. The government invited the Birla group by giving them one tonne of bamboo for one rupee that is almost free.
We started strike against the company and they at first bribed the media for not writing against them, but finally media joined us and we won the campaign.
Sumesh (Kabani the other direction): Kerala model of development is always a topic for discussion among academics. Ditto with Kerala model tourism development.
There are more than more than 36 struggles going on in Kerala against tourism development, Methrayan Kayal campaign is a good example. In Wayanad majority of the land is owned by real estate and tourism lobby. Even our 75% of coastal belt is in the grip of tourism industry. If we closely look upon some of the thing we cannot say that tourism has done only good things in Kerala. A recent study revealed that in Kovalam 7% of the children were sexually abused. It’s really a shocking fact.
Geo: we are not opposing people traveling or going somewhere, without disturbing the culture and ecological condition of the place. But tourism is now an aggression, aggression to other people’s habitat.
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T.Peter representing coastal area: I attended a meeting in Kochi before coming here to discuss about whether we should give permission to import high power engines for fishing. I opposed the proposal since the high power engines will deny the livelihood of the small fishermen.
The tourism lobby is now owning 70% of our coastal area and we become aliens in our own land. We need our coastal belt and we won’t give that to anyone. We are not against development but we will always oppose any development that breaks our ecosystem.
Varghese (Agriculture): In 1986, at the time of the formation of our state, as per the official figures, the state could meet the food requirement of 78% of the people, but in 2008 as per the statistics the state is producing food for only 5.75% of people.
Farmers used to hear big speeches from academic people about organic cultivation and all, but all these people won’t even plant a small tree. Then why should we bear all these hardships for these people who live in their flats, far removed from our realities.
