Resisting Dispossession

The book brings to the reader a set of political and social narratives woven around people's resistance against big dams, mining and industrial projects, in short, displacement and dispossession in Odisha, India. It abounds with stories and narratives of ordinary peasants, forest dwellers, fisher folk and landless wage laborers, which help make the canvas of resistance history more complete. The book foregrounds these protagonists and the events that marked their lives; they live in the coastal plains as well as the hilly and forested areas of south and south-west Odisha. The book chronicles the entire development trajectory in Odisha from the construction of the Hirakud Dam in the 1950s to the entry of corporations like POSCO and Vedanta in contemporary times. It covers extensive ground in interrogating both the nature of these resistance movements as well as the nature of industrialization being ushered into the state from post-independent India to the wake of neo-liberalization in the early 1990s and to the current times. The book depicts how and why people resist the development juggernaut in a state marked with endemic poverty. In unraveling this complex reality, the book conveys a world view of a vast section of people whose lives and livelihoods are tied up to land, forests, mountains, seas, rivers, lakes, trees, vines and bushes. It fills a yawning gap in resistance literature in the context of Odisha. In doing so, these narratives resonate with the current predicament of people in other mineral-rich states in Eastern India. The book is an endeavour to bring Odisha on the map of resistance politics and social movements in India and across the world.