By WILLIAM BOOT
BANGKOK—The Indian government believes its "strategic victory" in winning agreement to build two large hydropower dams on the Chindwin River is only the first of many such projects in Burma.
"The Chindwin holds huge hydropower potential and we intend to further strengthen this relationship by going in for other such projects in Myanmar," Jairam Ramesh, India's minister of state for power and commerce, declared in the Hindu News newspaper.
The Indian state-owned company National Hydroelectric Power Corporation (NHPC) secured the rights to build a massive 1,200-megawatt hydrodam at Tamanthi, and a smaller 600-megawatt capacity system at Shwzaya in northwestern Chin State bordering India.
These developments match in size and cost the biggest hydrodam projects planned by Thai and Chinese firms on the Salween River on Burma's eastern border region.
Despite Burma's chronic electricity shortages, which lie at the heart of the country's underdevelopment, virtually all the electricity to be generated by these projects will be pumped abroad to India, Thailand and China.
It has been estimated by some officials with Western human rights NGOs that the Tamanthi project alone would flood the town of Khamti on the border with India and force its 30,000 residents to move. An additional unknown number of people in more than 30 villages in the dam's flood area of about 7,000 hectares will also be forced to move, according to the German environmental group Urgewald.
NHPC was described earlier this year by Urgewald's researcher Heffa Schcking as India's "ugliest dam builder" whose operations at home and abroad "have left a trail of ruined livelihoods and misery in its wake."
Even within India the company had used terror tactics with armed staff to intimidate residents to leave dam development areas, say NGO officials.
The Tamanthi hydrodam alone will generate more electricity than the rest of Burma currently can produce.
Apart from the human displacement it is also likely to endanger Hukaung Valley Wildlife Sanctuary, home to rare animals such as leopards and tigers.
India's Ramesh sees it differently: "This is a major strategic victory for us," he said, according to the Hindu News.
The Chindwin projects agreement follows a flurry of high-ranking visits between India and Burma in the last few months, which analysts say shows a warming of relations initiated by India in a bid to counter what the Indian government saw as a threat from China's growing economic and political influence with the Burmese junta.
"This is the latest move closer to the ruling junta by India, flipping its previous pro-democracy anti-junta stance," said a European embassy political attaché in Bangkok speaking on condition of anonymity. "Europe had hoped for more support from New Delhi in international efforts to pressure the regime to change."
The Chindwin deals overshadow the commercial coup New Delhi achieved in April when Burma's second in command, Vice Snr-Gen Mauang Aye, visited the Indian capital. That visit resulted in a US $120 million deal for India to modernize Burma's dilapidated west coast port of Sittwe and improve connecting river and road links to the port from India's adjoining Mizoram state.
Before the Chindwin dams agreement was finalized last week, New Delhi had given Burma's government more than $80 million in loans and credits, and approval was given for an Indian company to build an aluminum factory in Burma.
"Indian companies should be aware of their potential complicity in human rights abuses connected to these projects, and that they'll eventually be held accountable," Matthew F. Smith of EarthRights International's Burma Project told The Irrawaddy, commenting on the Chindwin hydrodams.
"The government of India could do more for its country's long-term development and long-term regional interests by protecting rather than violating human rights abroad," Smith said.
Indian state media have quoted NHPC officials as saying the Chindwin projects are estimated to cost about $3 billion. India will also build power transmission lines to carry the electricity generated over the border into its northeastern Manipur State.
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