A recently released documentary shows how Adani is brutally dispossessing indigenous people from their lands, destroying farmers’ livelihoods and abusing human rights for its Godda coal power station
Adani destroying lives of Indigenous peoples in India to burn Australian coal at GoddaThis is the video Adani Group doesn’t want you to see. Heartbreaking new footage shows Adani Australia's coal is fueling human rights abuses and environmental destruction in Godda, India, where Adani are displacing thousands of Indigenous Adivasi people to build a new coal-fired power plant to burn coal from the Carmichael mine. But local communities are fighting back. Sign their petition now 👉 https://bit.ly/standwithGodda
Posted by Stop Adani on Thursday, July 16, 2020
In India, just as in Australia, Adani’s destructive coal plans are violating Indigenous land rights, destroying precious water and the local environment and putting threatened species at risk. Adani’s Godda coal plant will drain 36 billion litres of water every year from the sacred Ganges River - potentially putting threatened species such the Gangetic dolphin at risk, as well as crucial fish stocks. Adani have already started sucking up huge amounts of water from the surrounding villages in Godda with local farmers reporting their wells are running dry and their crops are failing.
Godda is in eastern India, in Jharkhand state, close to the border with Bangladesh. Adani’s proposed 1.6GW power station in Godda requires an estimated 5 to 6 million tonnes of coal from Adani’s Carmichael mine in Australia each year.
Despite being located in a coal-mining region, 700km away from ports, and India’s policy of phasing out imported coal, Adani’s proposed Godda power station will rely entirely on imported coal. Transporting coal over such large distances will raise the cost of producing electricity at Godda, which Adani plan to pass on to consumers thanks to a controversial deal with the Bangladeshi government and special concessions from the Indian government.
Adani is brutally dispossessing indigenous people from their lands, destroying farmers’ livelihoods and abusing human rights for its Godda coal power station.Adani requires 1,214 acres of land across 10 villages for its Godda coal-fired power station. Much of the land is fertile farmland and home to thousands of people. Three of the villages are predominantly Santhal, an Indigenous adivasi community for whom the land is sacred.
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According to a report from the Jharkhand Jan Aadhikar Mahasabha (JJAM), by October 2018 Adani had acquired 500 acres of land from four villages - Mali, Gangta, Motia and Patwa. Over 40 families have been affected by this land acquisition. Local villagers have started a legal challenge in the Jharkhand High Court to strike down Adani’s contentious acquisition of fertile farmlands, saying the entire acquisition process had been “marked by illegalities and irregularities” and was forced through with "coercion, fraud and undue influence."
Villagers resisting the hand over of their land have been forcibly kept out of public hearings on the project, and their land has been fenced off by Adani without their consent. When Adani’s earthmovers moved in they were accompanied by police as Adani uprooted coconut palms and removed paddy fields and a mango orchard. This disturbing video shows local women begging an Adani official not to destroy their land.
Hear their story in this new documentary released on the Stop Adani website recently.
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