Deal #10319

The Rabari are a landless pastoral, nomadic group who travel with their herds for 8 months and stay at the Charanka village for 4 months. The Charanka village has about 1500 inhabitants who were engaged largely in farming and animal herding (Yenneti & Day 2016:36). Maldhari raised cows, buffaloes and goats on the land of the solar park (Land Conflict Watch 2022, Hemalatha 2019).

Some people of the community and also few Rabari owned private land which was recognized (see e.g., land conflict watch 2022). The common land used for grazing by the community and Rabari officially was government “waste” land and was not recognized as community land tenure (Yenneti & Day 2016:36).

Different forms of resistance: The land owners had filed a public interest litigation in the High Court of Gujarat in 2012, demanding an investigation in the manner in which land acquisition was carried out by GPCL for the project (Land Conflict Watch 2022 and Annexes 1-3). 53% of the participants in the study had engaged in some form of resistance against the solar park or knew of someone who had. An example is the negation of consent (Stock 2023:203).

The land acquired for the solar park project came entirely from the environs of the Charanka village. It was a combination of private land bought from small farmers and a large amount of government owned land, classified as ‘waste’ land. This waste land had however been used by subsistence farmers and Rabari as a common resource for grazing and gathering gando baval (Prosopis juliflora), which is used for making charcoal. Hence, its loss represents a severe threat to their livelihoods and way of life. The small farmers and agricultural laborers also lost access to their land. Many local people had strong attachment to their land and were even worshipping it on occasions (Yenneti & Day 2016:40).

None (Land Conflict Watch 2022)

Verbal promises for schools, a hospital, drinking water and free electricity, ambulance and fire brigade (Kaur 2022, Yenneti & Day 2016:41). Promises of paved roads and solar street lights (Stock 2021b:6).

5 million Rs. were transferred to collector’s office in Patan but nothing has reached the village so far. Some villagers who owned land could sell it at a high price and could buy a car or build a house (Kaur 2022). Middlemen have purchased land before the project started, putting pressure on locals and illiterate people e.g., telling them that they will be dispossessed by the government anyway. Those who sold land were in need of money e.g., for children’s marriages or medical expenses (Yenneti & Day 2016:40, Kaur 2022). The middlemen, who had information about the development from government sources and newspapers, sold the land on to the government at a much higher price (Yenneti & Day 2023, see also annexes Land Conflict Watch 2022). Roads were built from the solar park to the highway (Stock 2021b:6) however, the villagers said they would not profit from that road and another road to the neighboring village was neglected and destroyed by the monsoon (Yenneti & Day 2016:41).