Annupur Thermal Power Project is a 2520 megawatt (MW) coal based thermal power project in the district of Annupur, Madhya Pradesh. The project is located at Laharpur Murra, Guwari, Belia, and Jethari villages, located in Jaithari and Annupur tehsils, Annupur district, Madhya Pradesh [1] This area is mainly populated by scheduled castes and tribes such as Gauds, Bhaina, Jaiswal, Ganesh, Munka etc. The project faced stiff opposition from local residents. People are opposing the land grabbing by the company.
Bhartiya Kisan Union (BKU) along with other activists carried out a fact finding visit to the area affected by the Moserbaer power plant land grab. They interviewed many of the affected farmers. They found that the entire land of village Mauja Murra of gram panchayat of Laharpur had been acquired. The farmers also stated that the project was illegally approved without the necessary environmental clearances. There was no disclosure of 37875 hectares of acquired forest land in either a public hearing or the Environmental Impact Assessment reports before receiving clearances from the Environment and Forest Ministry. The company did not even inform the central forest department about the takeover of such land. The Chief Conservator of Forests of Bhopal had given Moserbaer a list of environmental demands regarding the acquisition process based on which a provisional/in principle agreement to utilize the 37875 hectares of forest land had been given on the 4th June 2010. However Moserbaer did not complete any of the stipulated demands and went ahead and grabbed the forest land destroying the trees and flattening the ground. Moserbaer also illegally set up various bore wells in the area sucking out large quantities of water. The environmental ministry had not carried out any public hearings before the acquisition process.
There are 421 farmers affected by this project 35 of whom had been locked up in jail until the 25th June 2012. Their families said that 22 of them had still not received the compensation money but the company went ahead and grabbed their grazing and pasture land and pond. The local farmers added that the local legislators and parliamentarians were helping the Moserbaer Company instead of supporting the farmers and resisting farmers were slapped with false criminal charges and put behind bars. They also said that the local residents were not given appropriate information, neither was a village label meeting (gram sabha) organized nor any other meeting to discuss compensation rates before the acquisition of land. They have been paid a price of Rs 246800 per hectare for irrigated land and 145000 for un-irrigated land. The farmers said that the compensation is inadequate and rate at which the government has forcefully grabbed their lands is far below than the present market rate [2]
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