A media blackout, a ban on television crew, externment notices and a massive police force – the Maharashtra government has unleashed all these and more, in its arsenal to break the staunch resistance of villagers to a refinery project in the Konkan . Though shaken by the killing of journalist Shashikant Warishe in February this year, the villagers are steadfast.
Preventive detentions, alleged manhandling of protesters and banishing people from their very homes… This is all that the Maharashtra State Government is reportedly resorting to in its bid to conduct a survey at the proposed site of a petrochemical refinery project in the Barsu-Solgaon region in Ratnagiri district. As the protest against the Saudi-Aramco-backed refinery has intensified in the region, the state is making use of detentions and externment orders to censor people’s voices and suppress any news of their opposition to the refinery.
