Mehdiganj - Coca-Cola Factory

So, once again, this entry wasn’t written in a timely fashion, and the Coca-cola factory area visit isn’t fresh on my mind, but I’m going to use my journal entries from the time… so, that should bring some freshness to this entry.

Basically, a little background… there is a Coca-Cola factory in Mehdiganj village, which is about 30-40 kilometers away from Benares. Recently, there was a widespread report in India that said that high levels of pesticides were measured in both Coca-Cola and Pepsi products. For this reason, there were a few institutions that stopped selling Coke and Pepsi products on their premise. However, for the villagers in Mehdiganj and surrounding villages, this is not their main grievance. Their main grievance is that Coca-Cola uses up 500,000 liters of water (according to the company… other estimates are even HIGHER!) per DAY! The water they use is the ground water… which is practically free-of-charge, with no restrictions to their usage. Water pumps and wells in surrounding villages have dried up… and the level of the water table has dropped considerably (according to a survey, in the last 10 years, the water level drop has been an average of 18 ft, while during the previous two decades combines, the drop was approximately 3 feet).

I was in Sarnath as there was a JV shivir going on there… but, my main purpose was to visit the Mehdiganj area. Tenzin, a few years back, was involved in the protests, so he had contacts with the local group, Lok Samiti, that is heading the protest. I met Suresh, who is part of Lok Samiti, at the JV Sammelan just a few days before I was in Sarnath.

Before I headed there.. I thought about how I wanted to approach Lok Samiti –

1) get their grievances in person (instead of reading them on a website)

2) Visit the villages & talk to villagers à mainly about the dropping water table & what else they feel are problems w/ having the plan there; does Coca-Cola provide jobs to locals? How do they feel?

3) Trace up the Coca-Cola ladder – who are the decision-makers in this process? Have you guys tried to talk with them? Does the main office (Atlanta) have any say?

4) What is the overall strategy of the movement? What are the future plans?

5) Talk about InSPIRE program and the possibilities…

When I got there, Nandlal Master, the leader of the Lok Samiti group, took me to a Hindu-Muslim Eid-Diwali Unity Celebration in a neighbouring village. The idea was definitely a positive one, since most of UP and the Benares are has always been known for its communal tensions.

Then, we headed back to their center… ate dinner and talked into the night. Basically, Lok Samiti is a local group that was started by local youth. They were inspired by JP Narayan, and are part of a wider loose network of Lok Samiti groups. Sometime in the mid to late nineties, the group was started by Nandlal who wanted to improve the education in the area, and started working with boys and girls. Other youth joined him as well. Sandeep Pandey (founder of ASHA for Education, and noted activist) was making some type of peace march with his group and it was going through this area. That was when Nandlal first met him… Sandeep found about Nandlal’s work, and soon, this Lok Samiti group was getting funded by ASHA for Education. Soon after, Coca-Cola bought the factory from Parle (who had built the factory but enver used it), and started operations in 1999-2000. Nandlal learned about the movement in Kerala and also started hearing complaints from the villagers about the company and their water usage.. this is when the protests started. They started completely locally… but now they are connected with a bigger movement as well, against water privatization.

Now, they have a ASHA-funded center… where some of the Youth live as well… even though their homes are within 1-2 km… they cook together, they work in the fields together, they work-out together, and they work together.. over-looking the various education centres that Lok Samiti has, being in charge of their theatre team, figuring out the next steps in their protest movement, etc. They welcomed me… and it was pretty cool staying with them… talked a lot with Suresh, Mahendra, and Nandlal.

Nandlal went through his life-story, Lok Samiti’s story, and their grievances. Both.. the grievances and Nandlal’s story can be found online at: www.medhiganj.com

I asked what their methods of protest were.. and what their overall strategy is. There were 3 main points -1) reduce their market by creating awareness amongst people about what’s going on, and getting people to boycott Coca-Cola; 2) Battle through the legal system… get cases filed against the Coca-Cola plant; 3) Fight a bigger fight against the privatization of water by reclaiming OUR water.

I was wondering if there was ever any kind of real dialogue with any of the decision-makers from Coca-cola. And, basically, there hasn’t been. In big groups, they have gone to the plant, and also have marched all the way to the head office in Gurgaon (Delhi)… and they have asked to have dialogue in front of everyone… but Nandlal said, “They don’t answer any of uor questions.”

I asked if there were ever any small meetings, and the reply was, “They shold address the entire community and their concerns. They have invited myself and a couple others for meetings, but we don’t go. We want them to talk to us in front of everyone, so there are now complications. They’ve already told us that they won’t shut the plant, but they want to talk about some compromise.”

He had referred to Gandhi when he was talking about their strategy of protest… and I said, “Gandhi always attempted at dialogue first. Even with Jinnah, he tried so much to talk to him one-on-one before Partition.. even with the British, dialogue was the first road.” He mentioned the Quit India movement, and I replied, “But the Quit India Movement occurred after all dialogue had failed.” He sad that they considered themselves in that situation with Coca-Cola.

Later… I talked to others about why they refused the meetings.. and another very important, relevant point was brought up. It is very common for these big companies to bribe villagers to stay quiet… or to bribe villagers into a compromise. They will try to bribe the leaders of the movement. Or, sometimes, they will bribe one section of the locals and not the other… to create in-fighting… divide-n-rule. So, if Nandlal and/or others would go into a meeting with them, and come out with any type of compromise… there is the high possibility that his fellow villagers would think that he was bribed. It is a no-win situation. On one hand, nothing comes out of a meeting. On the other hand, some type of compromise comes out, but Nandlal and others may be viewed up as taking bribes, and how would they know if they had all the villagers’ consent or not??

It’s a tough situation… because I told them… there’s no way to have a real dialogue in front of 1000 angry people, either…. The Coca-Cola people obviously would get defensive in a situation like that. But, I see their point as well….

I also went to the actual plant, and visiting the surrounding homes. Here is my journal entry from that visit:

“I went to the gate of the Coca-Cola factory yesterday – and talked to the guard. It was funny, because Mahendra, from Lok Samiti, took me there, but since if the guard saw him, they wouldn’t even talk to me… Mahendra stayed away from the area. The guard didn’t let me in and said that there are no tours allowed at this Coca-Cola plant. I asked him if I wanted a tour – who should I contact? I asked if he could give me a name and contact number à he said that he couldn’t, he wasn’t allowed to. He seemed like a really nice guy, and, of course, got nicer when I told him I’m from the U.S. I told him about InSPIRE and that we wanted to bring a group from the US here.

I told him, “On the advertisement of TV, Aamir Khan says, ‘Come see for yourself and take a tour of our plant.”

But the guard said, not at this plant, maybe at other plants in India.

I asked him if I could take pictures from the outside, he said, ‘no.’

I’m like, “How about if I cross the street and take one?”

He said that was okay.

It was an interesting encounter – that whole place is like a military establishment… with high walls with barbed, electrified wire. I talked to a few people/families around the plant – and heard their stories a little bit. I saw a dried up well that was 50 ft deep. That farmer now has a bore well that goes in 200 ft deep. The farmer said that just 9-10 years ago there was water in that well! Another nearby farmer said his bore well went down 300 feet!

I saw a lot of the videos that Lok Samiti has made… interesting stuff.. effective? Yeah. To rouse up support and spread awareness… but what is actually going to bring success to their movement? Is the closing of the plant the only measure of success… or are there others as well? Is getting more people aware and passionate about the issue a measure of success as well?

I talked more to Suresh about ‘dialogue’ – and another factor was brought up – if one goes in a small meeting and comes out w/ some sort of agreement – then people could question if they took a bribe or not. And this is a danger. So, the Lok Samiti people say, “we’ll talk to you one-on-one, but only with the entire community there, because they are the ones who are suffering.

Whoever I talked to in the villages, including the children knew about the movement… they knew what effects the plant was having on their water and all. It was really amazing to see such thorough support throughout the local area.

Overall… it was cool – even though it was only 2 nights, I feel that I’m basically friends with Suresh, Nandlal, and especially Mahindra. I really like the group.. it’s young people, taking initiative in their own community…”