On Thursday, October 27, it will be 100 days since fisherfolk under the leadership of the Latin Archdiocese of Thiruvananthapuram had begun an indefinite strike against the Vizhinjam port raising seven major demands, including a construction freeze at the Adani port site.
The 100th day will perhaps witness the largest gathering of agitating fisherfolk on land and sea at two points along the Thiruvananthapuram coast; at Vizhinjam and Muthalapozhi, both 40 kilometres apart. On the 100th day, all the Latin dioceses together will converge on the coast and the sea. Over 3,000 fisherfolk are expected at both Vizhinjam and Muthalapozhi.
It is a relay model that sustained the strike; the innumerable Latin dioceses along the Thiruvananthapuram coast take turns to sit in strike. During the days of the sit in, the participants will also go without work and wages. Even then, the protesters seem undeterred. The frequent adverse comments passed against the strike by the High Court, too, have not doused their intensity.
Mutual dislike
If the protesters have decided to intensify their struggle, it is because they are not satisfied with the LDF government's response. In these 100 days, mutual suspicion has grown.
The agitating fisherfolk say the government is taking arbitrary decisions with the sole purpose of misleading the poor fisherfolk. In turn, the government continues to maintain that the strike is fuelled by “outside forces” out to destroy Kerala's development.
It is also clear that the government will not move an inch back from its firmly stated position that coastal erosion was not the fallout of port construction. Stopping construction work, the primary demand of the striking coastal folk, has been declared non-negotiable by the government. “The work cannot be stopped, whatever the cost,” Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan had declared in the Assembly.
Government concessions
Still, the government was forced to meet some of the demands. It has formally inaugurated the scheme to offer Rs 5500 a month as rent to the 284 fisherfolk families living in relief camps and who would want to move to a rented house. It has also signed a contract with Uralungal Labour Contract Cooperative Society for the construction of flats for fishermen families on eight acres found at Muttathara.
Rehabilitation of homeless fisherfolk was one of the seven demands.
Though it categorically refused to stop port construction, the government on October 6, the 81st day of the strike, constituted a four-member Expert Committee, chaired by M D Kudale, former additional director, Central Water and Power Research Station, to study the impact of the construction on the coast. An expert committee was one of the major demands along with the stoppage of construction.
The government, however, refused to entertain the protesters' demand to include one of its experts in the panel, citing technical issues.
The protesters, therefore, formed their own expert committee to carry out a parallel study. The government assured that the official expert committee would submit its report only after holding discussions with the panel formed by the Latin Archdiocese.
The terms of reference for the Kudale committee have not yet been drawn up. Sources said it would include an assessment of the harbour at Muthalapozhi where accidents happen with alarming predictability. Improving the safety at Muthalapozhi is another of the seven demands.
Vague assurances
There are others that have been agreed to in principle but for which the government has not worked out an implementation plan.
One is the compensation to be paid to fishermen, a minimum wage structure, for days lost on account of inclement weather. The other is affordable kerosene. The government admits that kerosene prices have skyrocketed but lays the blame squarely on the doorstep of the Centre.
The protesters want the state to do its part, to at least increase the subsidy from its current low level of Rs 25 a litre. This was fixed during Oommen Chandy's term but then the cost of kerosene was Rs 50 a litre. Now, it has crossed Rs 130 a litre.
“The government seems unwilling to give any firm assurance on any of the issues that we have raised,” said Fr Eugene Pereira, the convenor of the Vizhinjam Action Council. “In whatever the government has done, there is no clarity. Also, these decisions, supposed to benefit the local community, are taken arbitrarily without considering our needs,” he said.
Official whimsy
He took the example of the Rs 5500 monthly rent the government has announced for families wanting to move to rented houses. "Show me one house you can rent for Rs 5500," Fr Pereira said. "This is why most of the families still live in miserable conditions in badly kept godowns," he said.
Fr Pereira said that even the flats constructed under the 'Punargeham Project' were uninhabitable. "There is no water supply or proper drainage facility. "Even the special needs of the community, like space to store nets and fishing equipment and recreation space, are not provided," he said.
A government official said the housing plan had been tweaked to accommodate all their needs at the Muttathara site where new flats were coming up.
"We will stop this struggle once we get a clear response from the government," Fr Pereira said. When he was told that the government had stated in no uncertain terms that the port construction would not be stopped, Fr Pereira said: "What about our other demands? Is there any clarity on them?"
Pro-Port agitation
The anti-port struggle has provoked a rival mobilisation along the coast: a local people's collective in favour of the port. Though labelled a Sangh Parivar formation, it has members from both Hindu and Muslim communities and one of its leaders is the Congress councillor of Mulloor, the ward where the port is coming up.
The aggression of this 'people's collective' has many a time threatened to spill over into violent clashes. The police had done well to rein both sides in.
On October 25, Thiruvananthapuram collector Geromic George held peace talks with the leaders of the collective, extracting from them a promise that they would not cause trouble during the 100th-day protests that the Latin Church-led protesters will stage at Vizhinjam and Muthalapozhi.