THREE SHADES OF GREEN: Privatization, Pollution, Protest
Overview
Green, that was not! For the first time, a year-long Farmers’ Protest in the post- liberalization phase questioned the economic reforms agenda. The main thrust was that the State was leveraging public resources for private profit and giving impetus to ill-founded and unsustainable development under the banner of the ‘Second Green Revolution.’ The Three Farm Acts were seen as having a direct impact on the farmers’ livelihood, the food security of the people living on the margins, and the country’s food sovereignty. The protest was unique in many ways as it was a conglomerate of 32 ideologically competing organizations and a broad-based engagement of people from different socio-economic and religious backgrounds. The movement stimulated the creative impulse of Punjabi society with a large number of singers and artists who passionately voiced more than a hundred verses to shape a discourse of anti-centrism. – “Khichla Jatta, Khich Tyaari, Pecha Pai Gaya Centre Naal” (Pull up your socks, as we have locked horns with the Centre)
Pramod Kumar is Director, Institute for Development and Communication (IDC), Chandigarh. Prof. Kumar received his PhD from Panjab University on Violence in Indian Politics. He Chaired Commissions on Governance Reforms for the States of Punjab and Haryana. His work focuses on three interrelated themes in the domain of Social Development, Citizens’ Social Security and Safety Nets; Politics of Development for Conflict Management and Resolution; and the Practice of Democracy through Empirical Methodologies and Analysis of Public Policy. His latest book is The Idea of New India: Essays in Defence of Critical Thought.
Kumool Abbi is Professor, Department of Sociology, Panjab University, Chandigarh and Director, Population Research Centre, Punjab University Chandigarh. Her area of interest is Sociology (Family, Gender and Historical), Sociology of Health, Well- Being, and Culture, which includes her book, Discourse of Zindaginama: A Semio- Anthropological Critique.
Amit Kumar is Research Officer, Institute for Development and Communication (IDC), Chandigarh. Mr Kumar has done his Masters in Geography from Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India. His ares of research includes Gender Geography, Gender Studies, Masculinities Studies, Social and Political Geography.
