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Protest against Big Dams
A propos the article “Big Dams and Protests in India: A Study of Hirakud Dam” by A K Nayak (EPW, 9 January 2010), the construction of the Hirakud dam across the Mahanadi in western Orissa in the 1950s was more in the interests of the coastal people than the people of that region. Although, Naraj, in the coastal belt, was the most suitable site for the dam on the Mahanadi, political powers forced its construction at Hirakud.
A propos the article “Big Dams and Protests in India: A Study of Hirakud Dam” by A K Nayak (EPW, 9 January 2010), the construction of the Hirakud dam across the Mahanadi in western Orissa in the 1950s was more in the interests of the coastal people than the people of that region. Although, Naraj, in the coastal belt, was the most suitable site for the dam on the Mahanadi, political powers forced its construction at Hirakud.
The dam submerged a tract of very fertile land of that region along with huge mineral deposits and large tracts of forests. The project displaced more than one lakh people, with the worst ever resettlement process in the annals of rehabilitation history of the country.
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