The Hindu Business Line : Activism unlimited

Vinai Kumar Saxena, 50, wears many hats with aplomb: a corporate leader, a crusader for public causes and an environmentalist. “No, my company (JK Group) has never objected to these ‘extra-curricular’ activities,” says Saxena, who is a Director with the joint venture between the JK and Adani Groups, looking after the development of the Dholera port near Ahmedabad.

Currently he is busy working on a project called the ‘Self-Assurance and Mutually-Aided Affinity Network’ (SAMAAN) with the Gujarat Government to adopt four of the poorest villages near Dholera for all-round development. “If and when we complete this project, these villages would stand out as unique among the six-lakh villages in India,” he says.

Recently, this corporate crusader shot off an angry letter to British Prime Minister Gordon Brown drawing the latter’s attention to the undignified placement of Mahatma Gandhi’s statue at London’s Madame Tussauds Wax Museum; it was placed near a dustbin close to an ice-cream parlour on the second floor, instead of the gallery of world leaders.

The museum “tendered an apology” and moved the statue to the ‘World Leaders’ Exhibition’ hall on the ground floor.

A native of Uttar Pradesh, Saxena has however made Gujarat his home since the 1990s. In fact, he was selected in October 2002 by the Vishwa Gujarati Samaj, a global apex body of the Gujaratis, as part of the 16-member delegation visiting South Africa. In May 2007, he was decorated with the ‘Dubai International Award’ by UN-HABITAT for best practices to improve the living environment in Ahmedabad city.

A year later, his work with environment conservation earned him a felicitation by the United Nations’ Decade of Sustainable Development (UNDESD), UNESCO, UNICEF and UNDP in association with the International Association of Educators for World Peace (IAEWP) and the Social Organisation for Health — Human and Management (SOHAM).

Saxena is an expert in the ports sector as also in the domain of water resource development. In April 2000, he was selected by the Third World Network of Scientific Organisations, Italy, as one of the four referees for evaluation of an important joint research project in Yemen.

As Founder-President of the National Council for Civil Liberties (NCCL), Saxena took up the cause of the Narmada river, a lifeline for millions in the arid districts of Gujarat, and the Sardar Sarovar Project (SSP). After the killer earthquake that hit Gujarat on January 26, 2001, NCCL took assistance from the Hyderabad-based Earth Centre to study the impact of the temblor on the SSP using satellite images.

The organisation is also involved in Water Resource Planning and Watershed Management for Gujarat and Rajasthan. It commissioned a study by Indian and foreign experts in 2003 called ‘Trishna’ (Thirst) to bring unutilised water to the parched areas of the two neighbouring states.

In 1999-2000 it took up the job of deepening village ponds with local peoples’ participation in 13 villages in the Bhal region of Gujarat, thereby helping store rainwater for the whole year. Since 2001 it has also been supplying water in remote villages of this region during summer every year.

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