The Greater Common Good
Arundhati Roy
India book distributor May 24, 1999
Arundhati Roy is a well known Indian author and political activist involved in human rights and environmental causes. In her book the greater common good she tells how in name of development the government takes the rights of people. How the government gives twist and turns to situation which leaves its citizen in a baffled condition.
The book starts with Nehru addressing the people of village who were displaced by the hirakund dam 1948 "If you are to suffer, you should suffer in the interest of the country. There has always been a conflict between the needs of the people and the demands of government for development. This government does everything whatever they wish …show more content…
According to him building dams will solve the problems of drinking water where there is shortage of, irrigation problems. It will help to generate the power. His idea of development was good instead it was great but what he forgot about was the people for whom they were making development for. Were they getting really benefitted by this? Will building dams solve their problems? No instead they started facing a lot more problems due to these projects. Around 33 million people were displaced by big dams alone in the last fifty year according to 1999 data. Due to these projects many lost their lands, their livelihood. Government could take away their land in name of national development and the people could not do anything. To whom they would report as nobody cared about these poor people. The government hardly provided any compensation to the people nor did it listen to the plea of the people. People protested against building dams as it would take away their holy place where they have stayed for hole of their life. They gathered together to …show more content…
Instead they got their finance done from the World Bank as the WB was very keen to invest in these large projects. People protested on large scale. They did everything they could do to save their motherland. The World Bank appointed Brandford Morse as chairperson of independent review in order to make a thorough assessment of Sardar Sarovar project. His views turned out to be very different from the officials and the Word bank as he said that the project has no proper structure and advised World Bank to step back from the project. But the World Bank didn’t. Again they called another committee who gave the same feedback. The furious people then again protested this time in a massive scale. There was a curfew like situation where 5 people if seen together will be sent to jail. Many were brutally beaten, tortured so that they give on land. Many were illiterate so they didn’t ask for any compensation. A farmer Dersukh bhai just got Rs. 3500 for his house and five acres of land with standing crops. What kind of justice is this to the people who even themselves are working for the progression of the country. Not only the human but the animals also gets affected by this irresponsible behavior of government. As most of the land gets submerged in the dams
Arundhati Roy
India book distributor May 24, 1999
Arundhati Roy is a well known Indian author and political activist involved in human rights and environmental causes. In her book the greater common good she tells how in name of development the government takes the rights of people. How the government gives twist and turns to situation which leaves its citizen in a baffled condition.
The book starts with Nehru addressing the people of village who were displaced by the hirakund dam 1948 "If you are to suffer, you should suffer in the interest of the country. There has always been a conflict between the needs of the people and the demands of government for development. This government does everything whatever they wish …show more content…
According to him building dams will solve the problems of drinking water where there is shortage of, irrigation problems. It will help to generate the power. His idea of development was good instead it was great but what he forgot about was the people for whom they were making development for. Were they getting really benefitted by this? Will building dams solve their problems? No instead they started facing a lot more problems due to these projects. Around 33 million people were displaced by big dams alone in the last fifty year according to 1999 data. Due to these projects many lost their lands, their livelihood. Government could take away their land in name of national development and the people could not do anything. To whom they would report as nobody cared about these poor people. The government hardly provided any compensation to the people nor did it listen to the plea of the people. People protested against building dams as it would take away their holy place where they have stayed for hole of their life. They gathered together to …show more content…
Instead they got their finance done from the World Bank as the WB was very keen to invest in these large projects. People protested on large scale. They did everything they could do to save their motherland. The World Bank appointed Brandford Morse as chairperson of independent review in order to make a thorough assessment of Sardar Sarovar project. His views turned out to be very different from the officials and the Word bank as he said that the project has no proper structure and advised World Bank to step back from the project. But the World Bank didn’t. Again they called another committee who gave the same feedback. The furious people then again protested this time in a massive scale. There was a curfew like situation where 5 people if seen together will be sent to jail. Many were brutally beaten, tortured so that they give on land. Many were illiterate so they didn’t ask for any compensation. A farmer Dersukh bhai just got Rs. 3500 for his house and five acres of land with standing crops. What kind of justice is this to the people who even themselves are working for the progression of the country. Not only the human but the animals also gets affected by this irresponsible behavior of government. As most of the land gets submerged in the dams