Staff Reporter
ITANAGAR, 27 Jun: The Pare Project Land Affected Welfare Committee (PPLAWC) has strongly opposed some of the provisions in the recently notified local area development fund (LADF) for the hydropower projects-affected people of the state.
Reacting to the notification, the PPLAWC claimed that Clause 4.2 for the formation of the local area development committees (LADC) does not comply with Sub-clause H of Section 10.1 of the National Hydropower Policy (NHPP)-2008.
“It is clearly written in NHPP that a standing committee headed by an officer of the state government not lower than a district magistrate is to be designated as chairman along with male and female representatives of the project-affected people, and the project head nominated by the developer as members. But in the recent LADC notification issued by the state government, there is no place for land-affected families in the committee,” the PPLAWC alleged.
Further, the committee termed the move not to include the project-affected families in the LADCs unfortunate. “The people have sacrificed their land for the overall development of the state. But this kind of attitude discourages the project-affected families,” the PPLAWC said.
It urged the state government to modify the LADF notification and re-notify it to make way for members of the project-affected families in the committee.
“If real project-affected families are excluded from such an important committee, no one will sacrifice their ancestors’ land for power projects in the future,” it said.
The state government on 15 June issued a notification regarding the creation of LADFs for the hydropower projects-affected people of the state. As per the notification, the hydropower projects are being divided into two sections – the first being those above 25 mw, and the second being those below 25 mw.
For projects above 25 mw, 2 percent of the sales proceeds from power generation will be placed under the LADF, and for those below 25 mw, the developers will pay an amount worked out at the rate of one paisa per unit of power sold during every financial year to the state government.
The projects funded under the LADF will be implemented through the LADCs. As per the notification, the deputy commissioners will be the chairpersons of the committees, which will have ZPCs, ZPMs, and district-level officers as members.
Representatives of the project developers will be member secretaries.
