Tata Steel’s Rehabilitation Policy is people-centric to the core. Created with empathy for each stakeholder group and every family that has been affected, it secures inclusive growth and equitable development for all. A family decides to relocate only after having understood completely the benefits that would ensue as a result.
The interventions that have helped to deliver promises include every aspect of a community’s social well being apart from opportunities that facilitate individual empowerment.
- A well managed administration of a carefully thought out rehabilitation package, thereby ensuring that displaced families have control of optimum resources that are made available.
- Tata Steel ensures that every member of the Tata Steel Parivar gets the opportunity to assume leadership in generic issues. Relocated families are encouraged to participate in improvement processes.
- Extensive counselling sessions are arranged for Parivar members to let them make informed choices in every decision making process, especially in choosing a viable economic option.
- The purpose and the concept of organising oneself for self-help are discussed in detail. Relocated people are encouraged to organise themselves into groups that are capable of building micro enterprises. For women in particular, self-help groups are a means of beneficial involvement in economic activities that keep them away from social marginalisation.
- Functional literacy is facilitated by providing the people with relevant reading and writing skills.
- Parivar members benefit from improved housing and better facilities in their new neighbourhoods. An innovative balance of practical and emotional support enables them to comfortably adopt to their new surroundings.
Efforts have been made to preserve cultural norms and help maintain the ethnicity of the communities. The relocated communities of Kalinganagar are primarily a mix of Ho and Mahantas. Hence, the sacred ‘Jaherthan’ and ‘Sasan’ co-exist with the Maa Mangla temple or a ‘samshan’ in the Tata Steel Parivar colonies. Festivals like Baha, Maghe and Jomnama are celebrated with the same fervour as more common festivals of the region like Dussehra, Diwali and Rojo Sankranti.
Right to Information (RTI) Drive among Tribal Population
During the first phase of the six-month long campaign, Odisha Information Commission and Tata Steel Rural Development Society organised RTI awareness workshops in the Tata Steel’s peripheral areas, like Sukinda, Bamnipal and Joda. More than 5,000 villagers living in remote parts of Jajpur and Keonjhar benefited from the process through women self-help groups, youth clubs and civil society organisations. Further, around 100 PRI members of Keonjhar and Jajpur districts also participated in the RTI awareness programmes. This initiative has helped the project affected people to become aware about their rights and entitlements and other socio-economic welfare measures launched for them by the State and Union Governments.
