Ekta Parishad - non-violent people's movement for socio-economic change
Ekta Parishad evolved as a people’s organization in 1991. Prior to that, it had been a loose grouping of NGO training institutes that had created a large base of community development work. It first articulated the agenda of “people’s control over livelihood resources” in 1996 in the process of consolidating its vision around the key issues of land, forests and water rights. The majority of the people in Ekta Parishad at the time of its inception, were tribals or adivasis, who had been increasingly alienated from their lands because of constant displacement. They were also suffering due to being barred from entering adjacent forest areas, because of the 1980 Forest Conservation Act. This problem was aggravated with hijacking of water resources for the use of industries and large-scale agriculture. Without land, forest and water, people (and especially forest-dependent communities such as the adivasi groups) could not hope to survive on the land. This was the impetus that brought the groups into a larger social formation after 1991. By the end of the 1990s, Ekta Parishad had gathered around it a constituency of about 2 lakh (200,000) members.
In 1999-2000, the first padyatra (foot-march), which traversed from western to eastern Madhya Pradesh (before the partition of Chhattisgarh), was organized. During this padyatra, Ekta Parishad discovered that “walking” was an enabling tool, one that allowed the marginalized people to participate readily and with dignity, since it only demanded their physical prowess and not funds or political patronage. The foot-march, like Gandhi’s Salt Satyagraha of 1931, was also a way for people to highlight their rights and become visible by attracting the attention of the media, policy-makers and the general public.
Following that first foot-march, about a dozen marches took place in different states of India on various issues. However, they did not have the desired societal impact. It was then decided to hold a national march in October 2007 in the Declared Year of Non-Violence, starting on the UN day of Non-Violence, October 2nd, which is the birth date of Mahatma Gandhi. The march was named “Janadesh”, which means “People’s Verdict”. A total of 25,000 people came together in Gwalior, a city about 350 kilometers south of the capital. For one month the landless poor, tribals, poor women, bonded labourers, children and old people walked along the national highway, attracting the attention of people from all walks of life. After the arrival in Delhi, the government reacted swiftly and promised to meet their demands. It was one of the largest non-violent actions in human history.
The success of this march is being followed by an international march in October 2012 called the Jan Satyagraha ("People’s March for Justice") when 100,000 people will again be walking to Delhi from Gwalior, and different actions will occur in 60 countries around the world. Through all of this, the main work of Ekta Parishad has emerged : the mobilization of people. This is critical for any kind of social reform.. Read more:
