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By Meena Menon Rakesh Sharma's film tells of how the GMDC has capitalised on the Gujarat quake to displace the gullible population of two tiny villages. Using a natural calamity to speed up land acquisition speakes of the inhumanity of corporate and State processes
The 68-minute documentary film Aftershocks: The Rough Guide to Indian Democracy tells the story of two villages, Julrai and Umarsar, destroyed in the quake, and the attempts by GMDC to cash in on the helplessness of the people and evict them to make way for lignite mines.
(Director/Writer/Producer --Rakesh Sharma)  "What is lignite used for?" asks filmmaker Rakesh Sharma of the Rabari villagers in Julrai. He is greeted with blank looks - the villagers don't know anything about it except that it is "carted away in trucks." When Sharma tells them it's used to make electricity, they are incredulous, amazed and finally admit they did not know.
Their vulnerability and some blatant sidestepping of 'democracy' by the Gujarat Mineral Development Corporation (GMDC) and the government, is what will eventually lead to their displacement. For GMDC, the earthquake of January 26, 2001, came as a godsend, comments Sharma. (On January 26, 2001, Kutch was devastated by an earthquake which killed over 20,000 people.) The filmmaker, who was in Umarsar as a volunteer for Greenpeace, came across the GMDC survey team eight weeks after the quake, on March 26, 2001. Far from helping the villagers rebuild houses, he found that the team was ready with plans for their eviction. And quite by accident, he was in the middle of a thinly-disguised corporate acquisition which no one in the media has written about or bothered to find out about. The two villages in Lakhpat taluka, near the India--Pakistan border, are close to the Gujarat coast. Umarsar is an upper-caste Darbar village, while Julrai's entire population comprises Rabaris, nomadic cattle herders who had settled in this village a few hundred years ago. The two villages were almost totally destroyed during the quake and both are sitting on top of lignite reserves. The government-controlled GMDC has a monopoly over mining activity in the region. GMDC is likely to be privatised completely over the next few years; 26% of its shares were sold to corporates, financial institutions and investors in 1997-98. In a broad sense, the story of Julrai and Umarsar is not unique; the history of this country is replete with government and industry luring villagers away on promises. However, to use a natural calamity to speed up land acquisition reflects the total inhumanity of corporate processes and exposes the opportunism of the government and in this case, the GMDC. Lignite mining is more important than rebuilding the shattered lives of people, obviously! Where the film succeeds is in documenting the takeover process, which the magnanimous local talati, while urging villagers to vacate their lands, seriously believes is a decision "of the people, by the people …." The camera gets in on the so-called public participation process in Julrai-- the fact that many don't want to shift or are asking the right questions is totally bypassed by the GMDC. The Rabari village of Julrai can offer little resistance against this roughshod democracy where the idea of public participation is to call villagers, take down their names and ask them to vote. The talati, pleased with his own rhetoric, calls it a sort of vote on account. On account of GMDC certainly! The villagers are easily convinced - "the GMDC has come all the way here to our doorstep." As is usual, all kinds of promises are made to look after the future of the villagers and the proposal to shift sails through. However, there is a hitch:a few people are opposed to the shifting and see through the ploy of the company, though they have no idea what lignite is used for. A sixth sense tells them that the promises will be empty. One villager has the courage to tell GMDC to give a guarantee and first fulfill all their conditions, build homes and provide amenities. To which the GMDC official replies that everything cannot be in writing, there has to be trust! This trust has landed half of Julrai in the wilderness, as the film later shows. GMDC officials make the usual noise about the company wanting the villagers to progress. So of the 120 people present-the women stood outside (democracy is only for men), -88 voted for the plan to shift. However, the opponents of GMDC later say that most of the people were from outside the village and it was rigged beforehand so that the plan would be passed by a majority vote. There are 35 families in Old Julrai who are refusing to be conned by GMDC, while 35 families have moved to the new site. There is even a divine motive to justify both shifting and staying back. The very goddess who urged the nomadic Rabaris to settle in Julrai a few hundred years ago, continues to give them directions. Both factions claim they have seen the goddess proclaim her will; the fact that is divided does not seem to matter-each group sticks to its own belief. And religious sanction more or less seals their fate. Worse off so far are the people who decided to shift to the promised new site which is as yet barren and with no basic amenities provided. In New Julrai people have built their own makeshift houses and water comes from tankers. It exists as a settlement of squatters. Old Julrai continues to live in darkness as the Greenpeace solar project failed to live up to expectations. But those in Old Julrai are at least reconstructing houses with government compensation which finally trickled down to them earlier this year. The process of evicting villagers is almost like the giant machines in the open cast lignite mines, stripping away large tracts of land, laying them waste. The process is at once overpowering and relentless. The need for more energy, for more efficient production or performance, is above people's simple need for housing, basic amenities and livelihoods. It is clear that those who will be displaced are faced with migration and poverty or the prospect of ekeing out a miserable living in some urban slum. It is also interesting to see how caste plays a role in deciding compensation as in Umarsar which is a Darbar dominated village, people are being offered monetary (although paltry) compensation at Rs 3000 per acre. Even though one man pointed out that this was the rate some decades ago or more, there is no talk of money at all in Julrai! In Umarsar, the Darbars said their agriculture and cattle were affected by the mining and the flyash was destroying the land. Rainfall patterns had been disrupted and there was less water since the mines came up in 1974. Since then the water has become saline and wells too. Despite this some of them still believe that GMDC will build a new model village for them though initially there was opposition to leaving the village just because there was an earthquake. However, militancy in the ranks was suppressed after Mr Gehlot, the General Manager (from the Darbar community too) of GMDC, visited the village and gave some assurances for rehabilitation. Gehlot did not deign to visit the lowly Rabari village of Julrai. But with Gehlot's transfer, Umarsar is not sure if all the promises will be delivered. There is uncertainty throughout the film whether GMDC will ever deliver its promises. The villagers from Umarsar keep going to see the land where a temple, houses, pipeline and other promised amenities are to come up. There is nothing there yet. However, all the 36 families in Umarsar have signed the agreement to shift, which may happen by October this year, according to Sharma. Sharma still shoots in the villages and towards the end of the film, an irate woman from Julrai taunts him and his filmmaking. Why is he constantly filming and what good it will do them? Sharma has put his own savings of Rs 4.5 lakhs into the film and wants to follow the process to its end. "It is not a new story but the film shows that we have stopped even the last pretence of being a welfare State. It's a total attempt at corporate governance and the State is brazenly acting as an instrument of corporate governance," he remarked. Despite the grave subject, the film manages to inject a lot of humour into the complex politics of villages and the holier Than Thou attitudes of GMDC and the talati. The camera is alternately kind and critical and captures the subtleties and contradictions of village life without being condescending. The soundtrack of carefully-chosen Indipop with its puerile lyrics, reflects the bizarre indifference of consumerist lifestyles, which demand more and more electricity, and contrasts it with the simple aspirations of rural living, which are constantly being threatened. (The film marks the director's return to documentary filmmaking after ten years. He has worked in film and TV since 1985 and is a consultant to broadcast channels. Rakesh Sharma can be contacted at
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for copies of the film.)
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