Arunachal: Centre sends two RAF companies to Pasighat after protests over the Siang Upper dam turn violent

Chief Minister Pema Khandu called the incidents regrettable. He said peaceful protest is an essential part of democracy but that demonstrations must stay within the law and must not damage property or disrupt public order, and he appealed to all sections of society to keep the peace.

The two Rapid Action Force companies, which are a part of the CRPF, add up to about 250 personnel. They were to be airlifted from Navi Mumbai in an Indian Air Force transport aircraft and to reach Pasighat and take up positions by Sunday. The state already has a permanent deployment of two to three CRPF battalions, so the new companies add to forces that are already in the area. The Centre has said that it has reinforced security to contain the tension. The National Hydroelectric Power Corporation, whose office was set on fire, is the state-owned hydropower company that is involved in the survey work for the project, which is why its premises became a target.

The project at the centre of the dispute

The Siang Upper Multipurpose Project is a proposed hydropower project of 11,200 megawatts on the Siang, the name by which the Brahmaputra is known in Arunachal Pradesh. The Centre and the state government present it as a strategic project. They say it is meant to answer a much larger dam that China is building on the upper reaches of the river, which is called the Yarlung Tsangpo in Tibet and is described as a 60,000 megawatt project. Chief Minister Khandu has said the project was proposed by the Centre to maintain the natural flow of the Siang through the year and to moderate floods in case of a release of water from the Chinese side.

Many local communities see it differently. Opposition to the dam has been going on for a long time, and earlier protests in Beging village, led by the Siang Indigenous Farmers' Forum, were aimed at the pre-feasibility survey and at the forces that were deployed to guard it. Villagers and activists have raised the fear of submergence of farmland and homes along the river, and of the loss of sacred and ancestral land. An anti-dam activist has faced legal action over a public protest, and residents have held demonstrations ahead of talks at the Prime Minister's Office level.

What happens next

The unrest did not begin on Friday. Reports over the past months have described forces being posted to guard survey sites, legal action against an anti-dam activist over a public protest, and demonstrations held ahead of talks at the level of the Prime Minister's Office. Each step has deepened the distrust between sections of the local population and the authorities, and the violence of Friday night follows from that.

The first test is whether the security build-up restores order without further clashes. The second is whether the state and the Centre will talk to the groups that are against the project, since a deployment of force does not answer the objections about land and rivers. For the Centre, the dam is part of its answer to China's plans on the same river, and that is likely to keep it from backing down. For the people in the Siang valley, who have lived beside the river for generations, the concern is about what a project of this size will do to the place where they live.

A separate report from the state mentions an ambush on an Assam Rifles patrol in Changlang district, in which a jawan was killed and four were injured. It has not been linked to the dam protests.