Rope in residents for development: Medha
We have been residing at Choolaimedu for the past twenty years. We are clueless why the government, which provided us voter cards, ‘ has failed to provide proper sanitation facility. — Poonguldzhi, Choolaimedu ‘ Though the government had promised to allot houses two years ago, we are still waiting.
We are ready to construct hous- es on our own, but the govern- ‘ ment had instructed us not to build any houses. — Sathya, Sudhadhira NagarDemanding amend ments in the Jawaharlal Nehru national urban renewal mission (JNNURM), social activist Medha Patkar announced that she would produce an alternate draft shortly.
Speaking at the conference organised by the ‘Unorganised Workers Federation’ in the city on Friday, she said, “Every city development plan should be drafted after consulting the people. Due to implementation of coastal projects, fishermen are forced to leave their livelihood and move to far off places unfit for their work.” While companies are allowed to select suitable lands in the city, slum dwellers who settle down on the river banks are termed encroachers. Whenever the poor ask for houses closer to their source of livelihood, their demands are brushed aside, she said.
Ms Patkar said the government perhaps did not want the city to have poor and working class people. She wondered why the government was forcing the poor to migrate to sub urbs and providing land to the corporates. Under the guise of development the government is segregating the people and paving the way for a new kind of communalism, she said. Rather providing tax concessions and other benefits to IT companies and chemical hubs, the government should give concessions to the working class people who really needed them, she said.
Taking part in the protest against the Chennai airport expansion project held at Ramapuram, she said, “The acquisition of 137 acres for the airport expansion in the first phase is sufficient for the parallel runway project. The project will affect more than 10,000 families residing in four villages. If the government is really in need of the land, it should provide rehabilitation without compromising the livelihood of the people.”
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