Himmatnagar/Sabarkantha (Gujarat): In February 2024, residents of Kundol village in northern Gujarat’s Arvalli district were startled to see small machines hovering above their homes.
Kundol is nestled in the hills, home to about 3,800 people, mostly Adivasis, who run small farms but also depend on minor forest produce, such as firewood, tendu leaves that are bought by the bidi industry, and tree resin.
When residents contacted the district collector, they were told that the machines were drones, being used for a “survey” by the union government. Weeks later the villagers found out that their land, rich in nickel and chromium deposits, had been put up for auction by the government in November 2023. A union government press release of 29 February 2024 confirmed that a drone survey was exploring for minerals.
Residents were neither informed about the survey and auction, nor was the gram sabha consulted—a mandatory requirement for ‘fifth schedule’ villages such as Kundol. Article 244 under the 5th schedule of the Constitution of India provides for the administration and control of the ‘scheduled areas’, with a fundamental spirit of devolution of authority to the gram sabha in matters related to protection of traditions, beliefs and culture of tribal communities, protection of common properties and regulation of land acquisition.
From March onwards, the villagers held protests, met local politicians, wrote to the chief minister and President of India, and threatened to boycott the general elections of April-May 2024 if the auction was not cancelled.
A mining project would displace them and destroy their land, they feared, the latest in many nationwide battles (here, here and here) that indigenous communities find themselves waging to protect their land, livelihood and way of life.
The land is not only their sole source of livelihood but also sacred to the tribal community of Kundol, mostly belonging to the Dangi Garasia tribe, a subgroup of the Bhil community.
The Costs Of Clean Energy
The case of Kundol highlights the increasing conflict between India’s transition to clean energy and those who bear the cost of this transition.
Nickel and chromium fall in the list of minerals deemed critical for clean energy solutions, and in Kundol, mining for these will bring displacement of local indigenous communities and damage to the environment.
According to the International Energy Agency, a typical electric car requires six times the mineral inputs of a conventional car. Since 2010, the average amount of minerals needed for a new unit of power generation capacity has increased by 50%, as the share of renewables in energy investments rose.
The consequent tension between green energy goals and the impact on local communities around mineral-rich regions is a growing trend globally.
A 2023 report by Amnesty International and the Democratic Republic of Congo-based Initiative for Good Governance and Human Rights found that mining of minerals for EVs is uprooting people from their homes and farmlands in the DRC.
Despite a slew of legislations meant to provide protection to those affected by such projects, in Kundol, not only were the villagers not consulted—in contravention of the provisions of the Panchayats (Extension to Scheduled Areas) Act (PESA), 1996—but scores of locals also have pending land rights claims under the Scheduled Tribes And Other Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act or FRA, 2006.
Under the FRA, forest land cannot be used for development projects until pending claims on the land are not fully settled.
The Samast Adivasi Samaj, a tribal organisation active in Arvalli district, echoed these concerns in a letter to chief minister of Gujarat Bhupendra Patel on 7 March 2024. It said prime minister Narendra Modi had, at the Conference of Parties 28, called upon the world to mitigate the consequences of global warming by saving the environment.
“Let us support the call by stopping this project,” the community’s letter said.
Clean Energy & Private Profits
In July 2023, the union government released a list of 30 “critical and deep-seated minerals,” identified to meet the growing demand for clean-energy solutions, among other things. The list had minerals that would help India shift towards a “sustainable and low-carbon future,” and included nickel, lithium, chromium and platinum group elements.
The global demand for nickel witnessed a 400% increase between 2017 and 2023, as it is a major component used in batteries for electric vehicles. While releasing the list, the ministry of mines stated that there was an “increased focus on the exploration of these minerals in the country” through the Geological Survey of India (GSI) and other agencies.
A month later, in August 2023, the union government cleared an amendment to the Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation) Act of 1957, that would allow private sector investment in the exploration of these critical minerals in the country.
Until the amendment, India’s mining policy didn’t allow private participation in mineral exploration. Private entities could get licences to prospect (the work of locating or proving mineral deposits) and mine the resources only after the government had completed exploration.
Three months after the amendment, the government put up 20 blocks of critical minerals for auction. This was the first tranche of auctions allowing private exploration for critical minerals, which included platinum group elements, graphite, lithium, rare earth elements, among others. These blocks were spread across the country, but the majority were located in Odisha, Jharkhand and Tamil Nadu.
These states, along with Jharkhand Gujarat, Karnakata and Andhra Pradesh, have the most deposits of these critical minerals and are seen as the next big hubs of investment as per a recent report released by the Centre for Environment and Energy Development, a research and advocacy group.
In an attempt to speed up the process, the union government proposed a scheme by which it would pay private companies who won the tenders an up-front sum of 25%-30% of the project cost, to be adjusted later. Up-front payments were another first in India’s mining sector.
As of May 2024, the National Mineral Exploration Trust had approved six critical minerals exploration projects at a cost of Rs 9.03 crore.
The notice inviting tenders for the lease of the mining block in Kundol and its two neighbouring villages of Jhanjhari and Masota—covering a total of 547.80 hectares—was part of the first tranche released on 29 November 2023.
No Consent, Multiple Violations
After the villagers of Kundol first saw the drones, the district collector handed out a press release dated 29 February, which said the drones were meant to collect high-resolution data on mineral resources through a survey conducted by the GSI in 13 districts.
“Citizens need not worry or fear it,” the release said.
Praveen Amraji Damor (48), from Kundol village, told Land Conflict Watch that it was after the incident that someone found out through an internet search about their village being included in an auction for mineral exploration.
“We were neither asked about the drone survey nor the decision to put our land on auction,” he said.
The villagers knew their rights.
In a letter to President of India Droupadi Murmu on 12 March, they argued that the central government had ignored provisions of multiple legislations and constitutional mandates. The letter quoted Article 244, which deals with the administration of Fifth Schedule areas, the PESA Act, the FRA, the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement (LARR) Act, 2013, and relevant Supreme Court judgements.
The same month, the Kundol gram sabha passed a resolution against the exploration for mining. As a Fifth Schedule village for its significant indigenous population, Kundol falls under the administration of the state’s governor.
The PESA law, applicable for Fifth Schedule areas, is meant to protect the tribal population from exploitation. The act has special provisions that empower the gram sabha, mandating that no development project be undertaken without its approval.
Additionally, about 125 households of Kundol reside on forest land and had filed claims seeking individual forest rights (IFR) under the FRA on 241.9 hectares of forest land that was now part of the auction.
Their claims, first filed in 2008, remain pending without any update from the government. Under the FRA, until there is a decision on IFR claims, the claimants cannot be evicted from such land.
A Growing Suppression
The LARR Act also allows for tribal communities in scheduled areas to register their opposition to the diversion of their lands and resources.
Across India, however, tribal communities have experienced a growing suppression of their voices. In 2023, in Maharashtra’s Gadchiroli district, for instance, police cracked down on an Adivasi resistance movement against iron ore mining by private companies. In Chhattisgarh's Bastar, state-led aggression has threatened the lives of tribals who have dissented against mineral extractions for years.
Damor Bhrujibhai, a 63-year-old farmer, was perplexed how the government could put up their land for auction before deciding on the IFR claims or getting the consent of the gram sabha.
All the residents have small plots of land on which they grow maize and other food crops for their consumption at home, he said.
“Our entire village also collectively depends on forest produce like gum and firewood for income,” said Bhrujibhai.
The first tranche of the auction ended on 20 February, with a mixed response as the ministry of mines either received no bids in some blocks or fewer than three qualified bidders in others.
The auction of seven such blocks, out of the 20 offered, has been put on hold for now, and were expected to be conducted in a fourth tranche,
As per the ministry’s website, the fourth tranche of the auction, launched on 24 June, did not include the nickel and chromium block in Gujarat, with a tentative date for the auction now set at 24 August.
Of Protests & Politics
The villagers of Kundol were vehement that they would not agree to mining on their land under any circumstances.
“Residents from other villages are not willing to marry their daughters into our village because of the threat of homelessness after the announcement of the auction,” said Damor Laljibhai, a social worker from Kundol. “It’s not even about our homes and livelihood—losing this land would mean losing something sacred.”
For the Dangi Garasia tribal people, the land, forest and mountains are venerated deities, and losing them would mean losing their identity.
The villagers feared that the government was waiting to make a decision on the auction after the election in the summer, a worry borne out by the August auction date.
The Arvalli district is not new to people’s struggles.
In Idar town, barely 80 minutes from Kundol, laws were allegedly circumvented to lease out a mountain range to private companies for mining of granite in 2016. Idar’s residents are now worried that their mountains and land will be subjected to dynamite rock blasting again.
While PC Baranda of the Bharatiya Janata Party, the current MLA from the Bhildoa assembly constituency, wrote a letter to the chief minister highlighting Kundol’s concerns, the Lok Sabha election candidates from the region dismissed the perceived threat.
Both the BJP and the Congress’s Lok Sabha candidates at the time of the election said there was no serious threat to the villagers as the auction had been stopped.
Winning candidate Shobhna Baraiya of the BJP told Land Conflict Watch that some people were “spreading rumours” and that the auction process was only “experimental”.
Speaking to LCW in May, she said, “The government has not said the villagers will have to move out.”
Before the Lok Sabha elections, the villagers of Kundol decided to boycott the polling process to make their protest heard. But as Gujarat went to polls on 7 May, the village did eventually vote after sub district magistrate Devendra Prakash Meena convinced them that their demand could only be fulfilled by someone who could convince officials in Delhi.
A momentary lull in the protest ensued, with many villagers unaware of when their land would be up for the exploration auction again. Praveen Amraji Damor of Kundol said he did not currently have any information about the revised auction date, but villagers would resume the protest if it went ahead.
“Our district collector came to know about the issue after the villagers wrote a letter to the tehsildar office,” Meena said. “I was sent by her to listen to their concerns.”
He said he tried to persuade people that if they did not cast a vote for any candidate, no political leader would listen to their demands later.
(Sukriti Vats is a writing fellow with Land Conflict Watch, an independent network of researchers, which carries out research on land and natural resources.)
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