Fishworkers forum holds dharna in Delhi
HERALD REPORTER
PANJIM, NOV 12
The National Fishworkers Forum held a dharna in front of the Parliament of India, at Jantar Mantar, today. Fishworkers’ leaders and delegates from all coastal state unions participated in the dharna.
NFF organized the dharna to protest the draft CRZ notification 2010 and to demand its withdrawal by the Ministry of Environment and Forest.
Inaugurating the dharna, Matanhy Saldanha, acting Chairperson of NFF stated that “MoEF is trying to protect Adarsh Society (Mumbai), POSCO (Orissa), TATA (Mundra project, Gujarat), Navi Mumbai airport project and other such violations through the CRZ 2010”.
Rambhau Patil of the Maharshtra Machimar Kruti Samiti and General Secretary of NFF reminded the government of the strong nationwide fishing strike that was held by NFF on October 29 and stated that if MoEF proceeds with the CRZ 2010 notification, UPA Government will face much more stiff resistance from the fishing community and other coastal communities.
The NFF release here says that it earlier rejected the Draft Coastal Regulation Zone Notification 2010 for two main reasons.
It says that the Draft Regulation does not protect the right to life and livelihood of the fishing community to the coastal lands that they have been guarding so diligently for centuries.
They say that the NFF had given a detailed comment on the pre-draft notification and the suggestions and objections are not at all reflected in the Draft Notification except for deleting those clauses that were exact repetitions of the Coastal Zone Management Notification.
Further, they said that instead of seeking to strengthen the coastal environment protection, the Draft Notification is aimed at weakening it and seeks to throw open the country’s coastland for crass commercial exploitation without even providing security to the local inhabitants.
The Draft Notification by providing for industries, Special Economic Zones, housing colonies and tourist resorts along the coastline appears to be aimed at further marginalizing the poor fishing community and dislocate them from the land of our ancestors. SEZ in particular, should have no place within the CRZ, the NFF stated.
The speakers at the dharna included: T. Peter of Kerala Swatantra Matsyathozhilali Federation and Secretary of NFF, other NFF EC members including Narendra Patil (Maharastra), Pradip Chatterjee (West Bengal), Ramesh Duri (Malwan) and Ahmed Manjilia (Gujarat). MPs including Sampat (Kerala) and other representatives including Joe Athialy of Delhi Solidarity Group, Madhuresh Kumar of National Alliance of People’s Movements, Nanu Prasad of Jan Sangharsh Vahini, Afsar Jaffrey and Benny Kuruvila of Focus on the Global South, Nagaraj Adve of Delhi Platform, Shalini Sharma of International Campaign for Justice in Bhopal, etc visited the dharna and extended support to the fishworkers’ struggle.
