And the police assaults, obstacles and threats continued. We have lost count of how many more times we have been there. Countless people greeted us along the way, on either side of the road, walking, in rickshaw vans, cycles, from the areas all around.
As a result, we went in a long march, covering mile after mile, to reach the area where we weren't even allowed to stand before.
Despite all these obstacles, we managed to convey the news about this power plant in the area. It became difficult to interact with the people there, to listen to them, to understand them. We went there only to find the police had declared Section 144 in the area and so we could not reach the spot. A few months later we called for a public gathering in the area. We went to the area again to speak to the people. We looked further into the pros and cons of this project and saw that the country would be pitched into serious danger unless this was stopped. Sometimes it was the police and sometimes it was miscreants who would come and threaten them. Most of them were poor farmers and they said they were under pressure to leave the area, without being given any sort of papers or documents. We spoke to the farmer men and women of the village.
We saw the signboard after crossing the river. When we learnt about a coal-fired power plant being set up in the vicinity of the Sundarbans, a few of us, including engineer Sheikh Shahidullah, went to Rampal towards the end of 2010.
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