In Support of March for Justice – Jan Satyagraha 2012
FIAN International expresses its support for the struggle for the rights to food, to land, to water, to seeds and to forest of more than 400 million people in India who remain entrenched in poverty.
We recognize that Jan Satyagraha 2012 – March for Justice is a crucial mobilisation of indegenous peoples, landless, peasants and other food producers in India, towards realization of their rights, but, in reality, it is much more than that.
The march strengthens similar struggles throughout the world against land grabbing and for agrarian reform, such as the struggles: of the peasants in Bajo Aguan, Honduras, where more than 50 organized peasants and human rights defenders were killed during the last three years; of the peasants in Mali and Mozambique whose land rights are being violated due to land grabbing; of the Guarani Kaiowa indegenous peoples, in Mato Grosso do Sul, Brazil, who are fighting for the demarcation of their territories; of the small farmers in Mubende, Uganda, who were evicted to make way for a German company’s coffee plantation; of the peasants in Balapur, Nepal, whose livelihood is threatened and who are under threat of eviction due to the creation of a national park; of the farm workers of Hacienda Luisita in the Philippines, who are still waiting for land to be awarded to them as per Supreme Court decision; and in India as well, such as the struggle of the indigenous people in the village of Kusum Tola, Jharkhand, whose survival is threatened by open cast coal mining, destroying agricultural lands, forests and water sources.
The Jan Satyagraha 2012 March campaign is a large non-violent walk that will be carried out in India and in many other countries across the globe in October 2012. It begins on UN International Non-Violence Day, October 2nd, and will carry on for one month. In India, where the main event is being held, 100,000 people, representing different rural communities, especially tribal, landless and small farmers, will walk in formation together 350 kilometers from Gwalior (near the Taj Mahal) to New Delhi. The people will raise the issue about land being a key asset in development and poverty reduction, and that high levels of landlessness and deprivation need to be reduced for achieving positive national and global development. In effect, land and livelihood rights are instrumental to all people’s freedom.
The Jan Satyagraha 2012 March has been organized for several reasons. A large number of people are marginalized across the Indian sub-continent. Along with land-related grievances, there are farmer’s suicides that are increasing every day. Successive Governments are privileging industries and welfare programs (like 100 days of employment, MGREGA) as the solution to poverty, and these have failed to give the basic means of survival for people. Only land and sustainable livelihood generation can achieve real poverty reduction.
Leaders in India often speak about poverty eradication but do not act to solve the problems because it requires an over-hauling of the systems of land distribution. The language of land reform is found in laws and policies, but the government is not willing to carry out land reform in practice. Laws that are implemented on land are not pro-poor; rather they are for people who have wealth to generate more wealth. Tribal communities, small farmers and landless people can either chose to accept this with resignation and continue to be submissive, or they challenge the Government’s priorities. The 2012 March is designed to challenge a governance structure that is not working for the majority of Indians but a minority.
Read more about the march. Join the movement.