Abstract
Post-independence India has had its share of controversies around mega-infrastructure projects that have pitted environmental preservation against development concerns. This article studies the environmental controversy around one such megaproject, the Konkan Railway, employing a framework that integrates the environmental values, beliefs and behaviour of individuals and groups with a historical understanding of political economy and ecology (science). Essentialist and over-simplified environmental discourses, without scientific credibility and not based on historical facts, are often influential in policy making, especially when channelled by the middle classes. Better understanding our present concerns and guiding decisions and policies to deal with the problems we currently face, requires unmasking the romanticization of the countryside. We must replace the idyllic version of the past with a nuanced historical understanding of the interaction between nature and culture. This article also locates the controversy over the Konkan Railway within the frames used to study Indian environmentalism. The aim is to improve our understanding of the regional, ideological and cultural pluralities in environmental values, beliefs and behaviour of the middle class in India.
Highlights
IntroductionPost-independence India, has had its share of controversies around mega-infrastructure projects, which have pitted supporters of environmental preservation against development concerns
Access to infrastructure is an important element of development
Since English was the medium of choice for the social action groups and eminent Goans that were most successful in persuading the Government of India to suspend the work on Konkan Railway, these sources have the potential to capture the most dominant narrative around the Konkan Railway in Goa
Summary
Post-independence India, has had its share of controversies around mega-infrastructure projects, which have pitted supporters of environmental preservation against development concerns. This is especially so in the case of megaprojects involving significant public investment such as dams, highways, railways, airports and nuclear power plants. On the one hand, such projects come with promises of substantial socioeconomic benefits in terms of economic growth, improved incomes and quality of life, increased livelihood opportunities, regional development and national integration. Local objections against megaprojects claim environmental degradation, displacement, loss of livelihood, and disruption of the way of life of the affected community. Quite often in India, environmentalism becomes a proxy for critiques of modernity, which is closely aligned with the critique of a Nehruvian science and technology based "development paradigm" pursued by the Indian state (Alvares 1992b; Nandy 1988; Visvanathan and Nandy 1988)
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