Siang dam row: Youth body calls Nov 2 shutdown in three districts

A youth organisation from the area that would be affected by the proposed Siang Upper Multipurpose Project (SUMP) has called a shutdown in three districts of Arunachal Pradesh on Monday, November 2, to protest the arrests of people opposing the 11,200-MW hydropower project.

The SUMP Affected Area Youth Association (SAAYA) said the shutdown will cover Siang, Upper Siang and East Siang districts, according to reports in The Assam Tribune, India Today NE and Northeast News.

How the decision was taken

SAAYA said the call was taken at an emergency executive meeting on October 29, which was attended by representatives of the villages in the project area. The meeting resolved, without dissent, to hold the shutdown together with the Siang Indigenous Farmer Forum (SIFF), other community groups, youth organisations and residents of the affected villages.

The association has written to the president of the Bogum Bokang Welfare Society (BBWS), which represents the Bogum Bokang-Tuting area, asking for its support. In the letter, SAAYA asked BBWS to help keep the agitation peaceful and democratic.

What the protesters object to

SAAYA said the shutdown is aimed at the arrests of people who took part in the movement against what it calls forced surveys and the deployment of Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF) in the project area. It described the arrests as an attempt to silence the voices of indigenous communities.

The group framed its campaign as a fight to protect ancestral land, the Siang river and the future of the next generations, and said the issue was tied to the identity and way of life of the Adi community. It appealed for unity among organisations across the Siang region and repeated that its protest would remain non-violent.

Months of tension

Opposition to the project has hardened since September, when work on pre-feasibility report (PFR) surveys was pushed ahead with security cover. Protesters say the affected villages never gave their consent. Some protests turned violent, with vehicles and public property attacked, and the authorities responded with arrests and preventive detentions. The Upper Siang district administration imposed prohibitory orders on gatherings on October 11.

The protests have since reached Delhi, where demonstrators were detained outside Arunachal Bhawan this week.

According to reports, 27 villages could be submerged by the project and several dozen more affected. Many Adi residents fear displacement and the loss of farmland, forests and traditional livelihoods. The Centre sees the dam as strategically important because China is building a giant hydropower project on the Yarlung Tsangpo, which flows into India as the Siang.

The state government has said the current exercise is only a pre-feasibility study and not a final decision to build the dam. There was no immediate response from the district administrations to the shutdown call.