Feb 09, 20223

(moneylife.in)

By: Vinita Deshmukh 

Forty-five-year-old Shashikant Warise quietly pursued his journalism from Kodavli town of Rajapur taluka of Ratnagiri district. Unlike his urban peers, most of who have bent their nibs to the establishment, Mr Warise used the power of his pen to amplify people’s voices against the proposed massive oil refinery touted to cost Rs3 lakh crore and to be spread over 15,000 acres of land, occupying 11 villages.

On 6th February, a few hours after his story was published in Mahanagari Times, Mr Warise was killed in an accident in Kodavli, outside a petrol pump. An SUV driven by Pandhari Amberkar knocked him down, in a brazen head-on collision. Mr Amberkar is a known hater of protestors against this project, yet he roamed free. 

Mr Warise’s brother-in-law lodged a first information report (FIR) at the Rajapur police station. He mentioned in his FIR, that the SUV came in from the wrong side and dashed against Mr Warise’s Activa. The collision was so powerful, that Mr Warise was dragged along with his moped for several metres, leading to severe injuries. He was rushed to Kolhapur in a critical condition for better treatment but could not survive. 

Mr Amberkar has been booked under IPC 308, which is: “Attempt to commit culpable homicide.—Whoever does any act with such intention or knowledge and under such circumstances that, if he by that act caused death, he would be guilty of culpable homicide not amounting to murder, shall be punished with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to three years, or with fine, or with both; and, if hurt is caused to any person by such act, shall be punished with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to seven years, or with fine, or with both.”

As per the press statement of the Refinery Virodhi Sanghatana, an association against the Konkan Refinery, “Mr Amberkar was the same untoward element who had attempted a life-threatening assault in the premises of the Rajapur court, three months back, against protestors of the project who had gathered there. If the administration and the law enforcing authorities had taken action at that time, Mr Warise would not have been killed. The administration also denied us permission to hold a public meeting against this criminal offender. In protest against the callousness of the administration, we have organised a morcha at the tehsildar office of Rajapur on 11th February, as it is vicariously responsible for a brilliant and courageous journalist’s death, due to inaction.”

This ambitious project of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government has had severe opposition from the locals who fear hazardous chemical effluents that would damage their mango agro-industry and fisheries business, running into several thousand crores. Adding to its agony, this area has attained great historical value since 2015, with hundreds of prehistoric geoglyphs or petroglyphs, which are sculptures carved on gravel or flat rocks, being unearthed. 

These sites have been surveyed by the Archaeological Survey of India after a local NGO, Nisargyatri Sanstha first spotted them. Now these geoglyphs, said to be over 20,000 years old, have come under the tentative list of UNESCO and are likely to come under the world heritage list.

The state BJP government is in a quandary due to this recent discovery but seems unrelenting in its ambition to have this development as it tom-toms employment to hundreds of people, besides being a lucrative deal for the country.

In one of his recent articles in Mahanagari Times, Mr Warise had written that, with the discovery of prehistoric geoglyphs, this region has the potential to transform into a world tourist spot and hence, the BJP government was sure to be in a fix. Will it lead to the withdrawal of this project, he asked?

Venkatesh Nayak, director of the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative (CHRI), has, time and again, stated that speaking truth to power almost always results in harassment, injury and murders of whistle-blowers. Despite India having a Whistle Blowers Protection Act, which recognises citizens as legitimate whistle-blowers and would lawfully give them protection, it has not been implemented.

There are continuous cases of killing of RTI activists, ever since its inception in 2005. Maharashtra and Gujarat have the dubious distinction of the maximum number of such deaths compared to other states.

In research done on RTI killings in Maharashtra, it has been clearly established that even formal requests tothe police, for the protection of activists who have been threatened, are ignored. Thereafter, cases keep prolonging due to the alleged lack of evidence and there is hardly any conviction.

Mr Warise has left a rich legacy of bringing to light the awesomeness of the Konkan region which abounds with mango farming, fisheries and now a region of rare archaeological importance. Will nature and a historic belt so rare survive the might of the lop-sided economic development? That is the million-dollar question. As normally, even such brutal murders become a part of clinical statistics in the official record. Read more