Industry gets crash course in rehabilitation exercise
Participants from industry are also taught how to communicate with the project affected people, handle gender issues and redress grievances in a humane manner, reports Soumyajit Pattnaik.
Representatives of some of the leading industrial houses setting up plants in Orissa are back to the classroom at the Xavier Institute of Management, Bhubaneswar (XIMB) to learn about rehabilitation and resettlement (R&R) policies so that they can address the concerns of the project displaced people in an effective manner.
Participants from industry are also taught how to communicate with the project affected people, handle gender issues and redress grievances in a humane manner. The training programme, which began on Thursday, is being attended by 27 industry participants from Posco, Essar, Aditya Aluminium (a unit of Hindalco), Nalco, Monnet Ispat and many others. The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) is assisting the programme.
Lata Ravindran, a professor in economics at the XIMB who is conducting the training programme for industry. told Hindustan Times, “Many things need to be clarified to executives who are handling displacement and R&R issues. We are making them aware about the R&R policy framework like the Orissa R&R Policy of 2006 and the National R&R Policy of 2007. Apart from this, we are speaking to them on the Land Acquisition. We are also telling them how to conduct socio-economic surveys and social impact assessments of projects.”
According to Ravindran, the response from participants has been good. The participants also have panel discussions with government officials handling R&R issues. “Such interactions will help them to share experiences and clarify issues,” Ravindran added.
An industry executive told HT, “We knew that according to the Orissa R&R Policy 2006, families shall be eligible for employment by the industrial and mining project causing displacement or loss of all agricultural land. But we did not know that an unmarried daughter or a sister above the age of 30 would be considered as a separate family. This training has helped us know R&R policies in detail.”
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