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For some time now there have been talks that the Centre plans to privatise oilfields in the North-east.
A classic case in point is the Lotha tribe in the Wokha district of Nagaland filing a Public Interest Litigation in Gauhati High Court against exploration and extraction of oil and natural gas in the Changpang and Tssori oil fields. Furthermore, the Lotha Hoho (decision-making body of the Lotha tribe) urged the chief secretary of Nagaland to cancel the permit issued to Metropolitan Oil and Gas Private Limited for oil operations in Wokha district. The matter was raised from the point of view of protection and preservation of indigenous peoples’ rights over their own resources and as a way of standing firm against a lot of manipulative designs by vested interests. The Gauhati High Court delivered a leading judgment on all the issues raised by the Lotha Hoho.
The PIL challenged the constitutional validity of the Nagaland Petroleum and Natural Gas Regulations, 2012 and the Nagaland Petroleum and Natural Gas Rules, 2012, as well as issuance of the permit dated 28 February 2015 to the MOGPL by the Government of Nagaland. Commenting on the PIL, the high court maintained that entry 53 on the Union list has to be read with Article 371A of the Constitution — it stipulates that no central rule suo moto applies to Nagaland unless the legislative assembly passes the same through a resolution. Therefore, the chairman of Nagaland Petroleum and Natural Gas Board’s power of signing a MoU with MOGPL was being impugned as he had issued a licence in an irregular and illegal manner. The High Court stayed the licence, pending resolution of all the legal and environmental issues.
Peoples’ rights in Wokha district were by-passed by private parties in collusion with certain sections of the government, elected representatives and some influential members of the Lotha tribe. The Lotha Hoho is facing stiff opposition from newly-emerging interest groups constituted by local politicians and landowners who want to share the spoils from the oil and gas exploration and extraction — their organisation called the Lotha Lower Range Public Organization and Changpang Land Owners Union have planned to file counter-affidavits in the high court. They are also pressuring the Hoho chairman to withdraw the PIL.
Those opposing arbitrary mining, oil and gas extraction across the North-east have similar stories to tell. A few years ago in Assam’s Dibru-Saikhowa as well, the Gauhati High Court intervened on behalf of public interest litigants to stop ONGC from conducting geo-magnetic surveys. Akhil Gogoi, founder-secretary of the Krishak Mukti Sangram Samiti in Assam, was arrested in October this year for protesting against the arbitrary eviction of encroachers from Kaziranga National Park and was incarcerated for leading an anti-dam movement in 2006. On the other hand, in Arunachal Pradesh, anti-dam protestors in Tawang have been subjected to police brutalities. About 150 MoUs have been signed between private power companies and Arunachal Pradesh government for dam building and power generation.
All such activities in the name of development of the North-east region without fulfilling the basic pre-requisites of free, informed and prior consent from stakeholders, or alternatively conducting a public hearing as a mere formality, have resulted in major ecological and cultural concerns. Further such prosperity-driven, capital-intensive projects based on the extraction of local resources have created a crisis of identity — considered the main cause of insurgency in the region.
The inter-relationship between insurgency, ethnic unrest and mal-development in the North-east is deep and complex. Institutions of governance keep fuelling a kind of mistrust through their opaque and high-handed acts, while insurgency and local ferment make institutions perform at a sub-optimal level. For example, extension of the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act in Assam, Nagaland, Manipur and parts of Arunachal Pradesh, has a direct bearing on the creation of a still-frame that never acts in due consultation with the public. It rather creates an interested bloc that often assumes consent from the larger community — as has happened in many big projects like mining, dam-building and exploration.
The recent Central government action of auctioning oil wells in Assam as part of the new Hydrocarbon Policy of 2014 has opened up the possibility of the privatisation of almost 100-odd oilfields in Nagaland and Assam. The argument, as it goes, is that extraction of oil and natural gas will generate huge investment and boost profits for the North-east by bringing in both foreign and national capital.
The Constitutional framework that empowers local communities under Articles 371A and 144, and the Sixth Schedule, does not allow a straightforward taking over of natural resources by the state or the Centre without active consent from local bodies, elected governments and the public at large. The oft-adopted route is to bypass a democratic process and use force, both physical and psychological, to make communities serve the interests of a few in the name of development. What is further at stake there is the extremely fragile sedimentary underground rock and rain formations that sustain the hydrosphere in various river basins, which is never factored into any grandiose plan of exploration and extraction.
The other significant move by the Central government is a gradual cut in public expenditure — it has been done by changing the funding pattern of government schemes in the North-east by withdrawing its special category status and yet promoting only private capital in the area of natural resource extraction. For this purpose, the Centre has emphasised on the development of a few “fitting” skills among the youth in the region so that the demand for employment could be oriented towards the private sector. Then again the large agrarian and forest-based sector, covering 80 per cent of the actual production of goods and services in the region and employing a vulnerable section of the population comprising ethnic and cultural minorities, do not figure in this scheme of things.
What is at work in the North-east is an attempt at reducing governance to mere consenting authorities for fuelling a larger extractive economy. Even the establishment of trans-Asian pipelines, railway lines and highways, across sea, river, air and land under the aegis of the Act East policy, is all about mining oil, gas and water that significantly reduces peoples’ hold over their own cultural and natural resources. As a direct consequence, the legal and constitutional framework is being diluted and violated. One example being the Wokha oil MoU is in violation of Article 166 of the Constitution apart from Article 371A and the Sixth Schedule provisions.
The only silver lining is the occasional role of judicial entities such as the National Green Tribunal that raises several environmental concerns in mining-related areas. The present ban on coal extraction in Meghalaya is a good example — though it has come late in the day, it is a definitive way to stall something extremely deleterious. Every time the public concerned has to stand up against vested interests by taking legal recourse as their collective voices are often benumbed by using government institutions. The widespread grabbing of agricultural lands by the Mafioso, massive deforestation by a particular class of business, selling of mines and other such unrelenting exploitation of natural resources has already led to de-tribalisation and de-culturisation. Indeed some local collaborators are too entrenched in this as they see themselves as beneficiaries from the massive extractive industries.
Leaving aside the permanent damage to inter-generational good, resistance to those opposing manufactured consent is an important concern for nation building in the North-east. It weans away the very basis of co-existence and fellowship, as an extractive industry creates a huge migrant workforce, flesh trade, drug trafficking, black-marketeering, money-laundering and then, covers them up in the guise of prosperity of a few. Another method is to create some alluringly deceptive spaces of beauty and bounty that can attract tourists and legitimately facilitate greater investment on extraction of natural resources.
Fortunately or unfortunately, the North-east still retains some of its originality, which may be looked upon as a source of de-globalisation, that is, a resisting bloc towards a natural resource-based economy indifferent to the sensitive geo-ecosystems of the region.
All said and done, in order to bring the situation under control, North-east India requires appropriate policies of conservation, preservation and an absolute blanket ban on all extractive activities by private parties.
The writers are in the Department of Philosophy, North Eastern Hill University, Shillong.
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