NEW DELHI (Reuters) – Clashes between police and villagers over a $900 million port project by the Adani Group are the latest in a series of disputes over industrial projects in India.
Here are some of the major disputes that have involved companies in India over the past decade:
* Construction at Adani’s Vizhinjam seaport in southern India’s Kerala state has been halted since August this year after protesters, mostly from a Christian fishing community, blocked its entrance, blaming the development for coastal erosion and depriving them of their livelihoods.
* Apple supplier Foxconn’s plant in southern India’s Tamil Nadu state was shut for days after a mass food-poisoning incident in 2021 sparked employee protests.
* The Karnataka plant of another Apple supplier, Wistron, was also shut down in 2020 after contract workers angry over unpaid wages destroyed property, gear and iPhones.
* Vedanta Ltd’s copper smelter in Tamil Nadu was shut down after 13 people died in 2018 when police fired on environmental protesters calling for the closure of the plant. Vedanta has now offered to sell the plant, having repeatedly denied allegations of the smelter being polluting.
* Activists and locals have for years blocked Vedanta’s plans to mine bauxite in the green, jungle-clad Niyamgiri hills in Odisha state which the tribe people consider sacred.
* Maruti Suzuki’s plant in northern India’s Haryana state was shut for nearly a month in 2011 after riots at the plant after workers walked out once the company demanded they sign a “good conduct bond”, saying some had engaged in sabotage. One person was killed and 90 injured.
(Complied by Tanvi Mehta; Editing by Miral Fahmy)
