Development as recolonization: the political ecology of the Endosulphan disaster in Kasargod, India

ABSTRACT

This paper examines the Endosulphan pesticide disaster in Kasargod, Kerala, India. The paper argues that the pesticide disaster was the culmination of an agrarian modernization project implemented in the region by the state-owned Plantation Corporation of Kerala (PCK). An exploration of the political ecology of the disaster shows the recolonization of residents and nature by PCK through neocolonial forms of centralized and exclusionary spatial and resource control mechanisms. In this context, the paper questions the glorification of the “Kerala model” of development from the standpoints of environmental justice and resource rights, relying on the lived experiences of the people of Kasargod.

KEYWORDS:

• Development
• political ecology
• recolonization
• environmental subalternity
• Kerala model

Acknowledgements

I would like to extend my heartfelt gratitude to all the participants in this study who have been kind enough to trust me with their stories. Thanks also are due to C. Jayakumar, M.A. Rahman, Syam Prasad, Dr K.N. Harilal and Dr J. Devika for their support and motivation during the field work. I thank Dr Robert Benford for his support and mentorship. Thank you, Aadi.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes on contributor

Silpa Satheesh is a doctoral student in the Department of Sociology at the University of South Florida, USA. Her research interests are environmental movements, resource conflicts, labor movements, and political ecology.

Notes

1 Escobar 1995, 5.

2 Bandyopadhyay and Shiva 1988; Shiva 1991; Guha1989.

3 Peet and Watts1996; Bryant and Bailey 1998.

4 Endosulphan is an organochlorine insecticide that was banned in India by an interim order from the Supreme Court of India in 2011. The pesticide is a listed Persistent Organic Pollutant with acute toxicity that has been identified with a range of chronic effects, including cancer and impacts on hormonal systems. For more information, see http://thanal.co.in/uploads/resource/document/Endosulphan-fact-sheets-60826963.pdf (accessed May 2, 2017).

5 Mathew 2009.

6 Sivaramakrishnan and Agrawal 2003; Smith 1987.

7 Parayil 1996, 941.

8 Rammohan 1996.

9 Bijoy 2006; Raman 2010. Franke and Chasin 1995 calls Kerala's development experience as a social justice model.

10 Parayil 1996; Veron 2001.

11 Spivak 1995.

12 Jayakumar 2011b.

13 Mathew 2009; Jayakumar 2011a.

14 Misra 2010.

15 Government of Kerala 2011.

16 Interview with ex-panchayat member, Swarga, December 21, 2012.

17 CSE 2001; conversational interviews with local residents and anti-Endosulphan campaign activists, Kasaragod, January 24, 2013.

18 Government of Kerala 2003; Thanal 2002.

19 Interview with Akbar, ex-PCK employee, Enmakaje, December 28, 2012.

20 Interview with Shree Padre, Swarga, February 6, 2013.

21 Narain 2011; Rawat 2011.

22 Satheesh 2013; The Hindu 2015.

23 Government of Kerala 2003; for more information on the plantations owned by PCK in Kasaragod see, Annual Reports of PCK 1962–2016, http://www.pcklimited.in.

24 Interview with Moideen, Karadka, March 19, 2013.

25 Madhuraj 2011.

26 Balan 2001.

27 Rahman 2011.

28 Thanal 2002.

29 Government of Kerala 2003.

30 Rahman 2011.

31 Vanimel 2011.

32 Rahman 2011.

33 Nandy 1995.

34 Martinez-Alier 2003.

35 Interview with Muhammed, Muliyar, February 2, 2013.

36 Galvis 2009.

37 Alvares 1992, 2.

38 Pulido 1996; Egan 2002.

39 Sivaramakrishnan and Agrawal 2003, 5.

40 Interview with Shree Padre, Swarga, February 6, 2013. A local farmer, journalist, and activist, Shree Padre was one of the first people to link Endosulphan and health anomalies in the region.

See Padre 1981. A local doctor, Y.S Mohan Kumar, started noticing health anomalies among his patients living next to Kodenkiri stream (Enmakaje village) during this same period.

41 Nandy 1995, 13.

42 Heller, Harilal, and Chaudhuri 2007.