The Hindu Business Line : Go slow, they're at work

MUTE TESTIMONY: Villagers of Katalwadi prepare the temple ground for Navarathri celebrations as the quiet smokestacks of Dabhol Power Company rise in the background. — Vivek Bendre

Anjanvel , Ratnagiri Dist.

IN the tiny villages surrounding the giant power plant erected by Enron, a small people's movement that promises no jackpot jobs but helps lay the foundation for a living is fledgling. In a way the people owe it to the fallen multinational energy giant.

When Dabhol Power Company's plant shut down two years ago, a group of people that was the core of local protest against the mammoth power project channelled its energy into forming a non-farm co-operative that would help members set up small enterprises.

The 500-member Shri Uttraj Kaleswari Gramin Bigarshethi Sahakari Pad Sanstha (a co-operative non-farm thrift society) at village Anjanvel has distributed nearly Rs 14 lakh in the past one-and-half year of existence to about 100 members. "Enron, with its Rs 9,000 crore investment, promised about 200 jobs to our villagers. We have managed to provide a living to more than 100 people with just a few lakhs," said Yeshwant Baeet, a driving force behind the co-operative.

Baeet, who left his job with Bank of Baroda in Mumbai when offered a golden handshake some years ago, has spent the best part of the past decade fighting the Enron prakalp (project).

"This initiative would not have happened if not for Enron. We had come together to protest the power plant. We worked relentlessly against it. We were united, determined and focussed with a sense of purpose. After the plant closed down, we applied the lessons from the struggle to forge this development initiative (thrift society)," he said. Today, when he is not working his farms, he devotes time to the society and other issues concerning his village.

The society, for example, helped Noor Khan Pathan, who had to give up 1.12 hectares of his land to the Dabhol Power Company, with a loan of Rs 26,000. Pathan set up a flourmill that earns him about Rs 2,500-3,000 per month. He would repay the loan at Rs 750 every month over three years. Similarly, the Sanstha has helped others set up paan-beedi shops, poultry farms, buy fishing nets or farm implements, repair boats or any enterprise that could be funded by its modest means.

Members of the co-operative are from the three villages of Anjanvel, Ranvi and Veldur. Nearly 450 farmers from these villages had to give up 610 acres of their land to DPC. About half of them did not accept money in protest. Many, like Anant Barghode of Ranvi, who opted for a "permanent" job instead of money (Rs 1 lakh), are without land or job today.

#Barghode was sent by the company for a one-year agricultural training at an institute at Dapoli. After completion of training he was to join DPC's horticulture division that was to develop the company's campus into a farm. Today, as he waits for the plant to restart, Barghode ekes out a meagre living from odd jobs.

As you drive through post-card country along well-paved roads (courtesy Enron), you meet those like Noor Pathan, who have picked up the broken pieces. There are also those like Barghode, who live a shattered life.

Says Vittal Bhalekar, secretary of the thrift society and Sarpanch of the fishing village Veldur, "We do not need big projects. Our people are content with modest earnings and peace of mind. Just do not pollute our clean waters and disturb our farm lands." Like Baba Bhalekar, as he is popularly known here, says, the villagers here know how to live and let live. They don't need advice or fast track, mega projects.

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