Narmada Bachao Andolan

**Bachao!**The Andolan for the Narmada reaches a crucial stage.

**Dear Friends,**The struggle in the Narmada valley is at a critical juncture. The Supreme Court of India will start deliberations on the petition of the Narmada Bachao Andolan (NBA) on Feb, 8 2000. This is expected to be the FINAL HEARING and lead to FINAL “DISPOSAL” of the petition. Considering the gravity of the situation, there is a need to mobilise ourselves and extend support to the NBA. If you can put in any time and/or effort towards this cause, please let us know. Currently, there are various groups and individuals outside India who are loosely networked, ie. the IRN, Narmada Solidarity Coalition in NYC, AID-Narmada etc. However, we feel that there is a great need to pool our resources and co-ordinate our efforts. Working together, we can have a significant impact. Based on discussions with people from the above groups, a proposal has been put forward to have an “Action Group” which will focus on the Save the Narmada Movement, the National Alliance of People’s Movements and related issues. As a part of its work, it will co-ordinate and network with various organizations towards the common agenda of aiding and supporting the Save the Narmada Movement.The key issue here is that we ACT, ACT QUICKLY and ACT TOGETHER.Work needs to be carried out in the following areas.

• Publicity & Media Writing letters to heads of state, articles, letters in newspapers, responses to pro-dammers, etc…
• Corporate Watch Vigilance about which multinational is funding the Maheshwar project / other projects, contacting them to convince them otherwise, blacklisting the Dam projects with environmental mags, groups, corporate mags, groups.
• Community Outreach Building awareness in the general public and Indian community in specific.
• Networking with organizations / minority groups in the U.S. Networking, building / renewing relationships with greens, minority, human rights, developmental, other organizations, to build up support, plan joint action and co-ordinate efforts.
• Website Documentation of the movement, Compiling information and putting it on the web page web page maintenance / updates (including monitoring media for all Narmada related info).
• Miscellaneous Consolidation of mailing lists for purposes of action alerts / posting info.

If you / your organization can take up responsibilities in any of these areas, please call us / we’ll call you. If you are responding to this in email, please email us the following information. Your name, the workgroup(s) which you can volunteer in, your email address, your current location, and telephone number. Please send your email to me following the link below.Suggestions are welcome. On behalf of the Friends of the Narmada,Vidhi Parthasarathy February 2000

**- Visit the Andolan’s friends on the web

• Read India Together’s earlier account of the NBA**

---