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print versionGlobal day of action against Vedanta draws thousands in London, Odisha and Goa!
More than 100 protesters from Foil Vedanta and other organisations crowded the entrance to Vedanta Resources’ London AGM and poured red paint on the steps yesterday in an attempt to disrupt the meeting. In Goa and Odisha in India where Vedanta operates, parallel demonstrations involving thousands of people affected by the company’s activities took place on Monday and Tuesday. Inside the AGM the meeting was once again dominated by dissident shareholders who pointed out Vedanta’s racism, major environmental and social violations and poor governance.
London:
More than 100 grassroots protestors gathered at the Lincoln Centre where the AGM was held. They carried placards depicting shocking pictures of Vedanta’s atrocities including the 100 dead at the Korba chimney collapse in 20091 and shouted slogans calling for the arrest of Vedanta chief Anil Agarwal for the hundreds of workers deaths and murders Vedanta is implicated in and shouted ‘blood on your hands!’. They called for London to withdraw support for the company accused by CBI’s Richard Lambert and the British parliament for giving the FTSE 100 a bad name. Despite these scandals Agarwal gave himself a 16% pay rise this year. There was a noticeable absence of NGOs in the demonstration this year, though the grassroots groups managed to draw larger crowds than ever.
Two activists dressed as Vedanta executives and holding Vedanta’s Annual report spilled litres of red paint over a woman covered with a white sheet on the steps of the AGM. Shortly afterwards Anil Agarwal and Vedanta executives arrived in a blacked out car and were unable to enter the AGM, while others trailed the red paint into the building. The symbolic action referred to the hundreds who have died either working at or opposing Vedanta’s factories and mines. In response the protesters chanted ‘murderer!’ and surrounded Anil Agarwal’s car. In response riot vans of police with tasers arrived to blockade the entrance to the building. Later when a woman was sent to clean up the fake blood with a dustpan and brush the group chanted ‘Vedanta – clean up your own mess!’ and ‘stop the cover up!’ drawing the parallel with the many incidents in which Vedanta has washed its hands of its own atrocities.
