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Protests against K-Rail rock Kerala
Slogans of Nandigram were also heard across protest venues, referring to the large-scale violence in the West Bengal district between 2007-08, which resulted in 14 deaths and more than 100injured, and also led to the fall of the left regime in the state.
Kerala police on Monday booked more than 300 people as protests erupted across the state against the proposed high-speed K-Rail project, with the Communist Party of India (Marxist) or the CPI (M) government insisting that it will go ahead with its plans.
In several districts, people, including workers of Opposition parties, uprooted survey stones and blocked officials and police from entering the project sites. Survey officials were also blocked in Kottayam, Kochi and Kozhikode districts.
The protesters have been booked under section 353 (preventing government officers from carrying out their job), police said.
“For us, it is a life and death struggle. We are losing our house, which we toiled to build. The government will have to kill us before building the K-Rail. We never expected this from a Communist regime,” said P Bincy, a retired nurse, who will be losing her house in Changanassery, Kottayam district. Even though the government has announced a relief package, Bincy said locals have rejected it.
Slogans of Nandigram were also heard across protest venues, referring to the large-scale violence in the West Bengal district between 2007-08, which resulted in 14 deaths and more than 100injured, and also led to the fall of the left regime in the state.
The Congress-led opposition United Democratic Front (UDF) often invoked Nandigram to warn the government against the project. However, the government maintained that the project cannot be pulled back citing old unrest in West Bengal.
“Opposition wants Nandigram-like violence here so they are provoking people to turn against the government. All forces, Congress, BJP and the Social Democratic Front of India, have joined hands. But the government will go ahead. It is a project for future generations and the government will not shy away from it,” said party state secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnan in Kannur, which is going to be the venue of the party’s next congress in the first week of April. He said the ongoing agitation was politically-motivated and the party would deal with it politically.
Opposition leader V D Satheesan said the UDF workers will oppose K-Rail tooth and nail, and they are ready to fill the jails. “We will not allow this to happen in the state. Our leaders will remove survey stones and court arrest. The state has never witnessed such a protest, and the government is facing a Nandigram-like situation,” he said in Chenganoor in the Alappuzha district.
He added that the UDF would organise 100 meetings across the state to create awareness against the project and streamline ongoing protests.
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has also opposed the project. “The government is troubling a large section of the people in the name of a project, which was not even approved by the Union government,” said party state president K Surendran.
The project is proposed to connect north Kerala’s Kasaragod and Thiruvananthapuram in the south and reduce the present travel time of 12 hours to four, said Kerala Rail Development Corporation Ltd. “We will continue with our stone laying work. Removed stones will be re-laid again,” said K Rail MD Ajith Kumar. He said the social impact study was getting delayed due to the ongoing protests.
The government is expected to complete the ₹63,491 crore project by 2025, but experts said it will take a minimum of 10 years, and the cost may go up at least three times. Many experts, including Metro Man E Sreedharan, said high-speed trains are not feasible to operate on wetlands, and its rail alignment was also flawed.
Besides the Opposition, many conservationists and activists are also opposing the project. They said the project was implemented without any homework or serious studies. “It will be a disaster for the state, which has been going through a rough climate patch in the last few years,” said environmental activist C R Neelakandan, who wants the government to improve the existing rail network other than displacing thousands of families.
