Tens of Thousands Protest for Democracy in the Forests, India

Rajasthan, Gujarat, Maha­rash­tra, Mad­hya Pradesh, Chhat­tis­garh, Jhark­hand, and Oris­sa wit­ness chak­ka jams, ras­ta rokos, dhar­nas, mor­chas and oth­er protests.

Today in State cap­i­tals and dis­trict head­quar­ters across the coun­try, many tens of thou­sands of peo­ple joined mor­chas, dhar­nas and ras­ta rokos with the fol­low­ing demands:

Rajasthan, Gujarat, Maha­rash­tra, Mad­hya Pradesh, Chhat­tis­garh, Jhark­hand, and Oris­sa wit­ness chak­ka jams, ras­ta rokos, dhar­nas, mor­chas and oth­er protests.

Today in State cap­i­tals and dis­trict head­quar­ters across the coun­try, many tens of thou­sands of peo­ple joined mor­chas, dhar­nas and ras­ta rokos with the fol­low­ing demands:

* Halt For­est Depart­ment inter­fer­ence, exclu­sion of rights hold­ers, and vio­la­tion of peo­ple’s rights under under the For­est Rights Act;
* Recog­nise our right and pow­er to pro­tect and con­trol our forests and resources;
* Stop ille­gal­ly destroy­ing forests and rob­bing us of our resources through diver­sion for pri­vate com­pa­nies and large projects.

In a tragedy, four pro­test­ers were killed and two seri­ous­ly injured in Devala, Udaipur Dis­trict, when a lor­ry hit the pro­test­ers as their ras­ta roko was end­ing. The organ­i­sa­tion is pur­su­ing the case to ensure that the dri­ver and oth­er con­cerned per­sons are arrest­ed and brought to jus­tice. Those who lost their lives in the strug­gle will be hon­oured as mar­tyrs.

Protests took place in the fol­low­ing States:

Rajasthan: Chak­ka jams took place in Ban­swa­da, Dun­garpur, Udaipur, Prat­ap­garh Dis­tricts, in total in 12 loca­tions. More than 6,000 peo­ple par­tic­i­pat­ed. The ras­ta rokos includ­ed a block­ade on the Nation­al High­way at Chind­wara More.

Oris­sa: More than 5,000 peo­ple par­tic­i­pat­ed in a chak­ka jam in Bhubanesh­war, shut­ting down the main cross­roads in the city for more than two hours. Peo­ple joined the demon­stra­tion from across the state. Protests also took place in major dis­trict head­quar­ters.

Maha­rash­tra: Ras­ta rokos took place through­out the State, in sev­er­al loca­tions in Thane Dis­trict (on the Ahmed­abad – Mum­bai nation­al high­way), in two places in Raigad dis­trict, in 4 places in Nan­dur­bar dis­trict (ras­ta rokos will con­tin­ue over the next three days in oth­er loca­tions in the dis­trict).

Mad­hya Pradesh: Approx­i­mate­ly 4,000 peo­ple from 20 dis­tricts joined a chak­ka jam in Bhopal for sev­er­al hours. More than 3,000 peo­ple court­ed arrest and were arrest­ed.

Gujarat: Mass ral­lies took place in Rajpi­pla (10,000 peo­ple), Dharam­pur (4,000 peo­ple), Sabarkan­tha Dis­trict (dhar­nas at three loca­tions). Protests will take place in Cho­ta Udaipur, Vyara and Bhilwa­da are expect­ed in the com­ing days, in which sev­er­al thou­sand peo­ple are expect­ed to par­tic­i­pate.

Chhat­tis­garh: A mass dhar­na took place in Raipur in which approx­i­mate­ly 1,000 peo­ple par­tic­i­pat­ed.

Jhark­hand: Peo­ple from Kun­ti, Haz­arib­agh and Ranchi dis­trict joined a mass demon­stra­tion in Ranchi. Ral­lies took place at the sub-divi­sion­al lev­el in East Singhb­hum and at the block lev­el in Late­har, Pala­mau, West Singhb­hum Dis­tricts.

The pas­sage of the For­est Rights Act in Decem­ber 2006 was a his­toric step for­ward for the strug­gle against the auto­crat­ic, bru­tal and repres­sive rule of colo­nial laws and the For­est Depart­ment in Indi­a’s forests. But the mere pas­sage of a law is not enough to over­turn a cen­tu­ry of oppres­sion. Today, the fight con­tin­ues for a new order in the forests – one built around democ­ra­cy instead of bureau­cra­cy, around the peo­ple rather than the offi­cials, and around the forests and their cit­i­zens rather than the cor­po­rates and cap­i­tal.