JAITAPUR, India — When Vijay Raut talks about the government’s plans to throw the villagers of Madbad off their land to make way for the world’s largest nuclear power plant, his voice quickly rises in volume. The tendons stand out in his neck as he describes how government officials and the Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd. (NPCIL) have trampled local resistance.
“Is this a democracy?” demands Raut, who was jailed along with some 18 protesters after what local police termed a riot in early March. “They came and started the survey without even explaining the purpose properly to us. Then they would not let us talk as a single voice. When they came to negotiate for the land in 2006-07, if at all you could call it that, they would not let us even stand around as a group. Individual farmers were called in to tell them their land was being acquired.”
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