In March 2016, Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC), undertook its first research mission dedicated to internal displacement caused by development projects. Later this year IDMC will issue a report based on its findings and targeted recommendations.

This is IDMC’s first major step in establishing a formal area of work on development-caused displacement that will include data collection, research, analysis and policy influencing.

India is booming. Everywhere we went there was evidence of development, whether the establishment of a metro transport system in Cochin, the expansion of Jharkhand’s capital city Ranchi, or the construction of new housing blocks on the outskirts of New Delhi.  

This is nothing new for India. Development projects have been going on for decades. Experts estimate from 60 to 70 million people have been displaced in India by development projects since 1950. India, therefore, was a good starting point for IDMC to examine some of the issues that are at the heart of expanding our monitoring of this global phenomenon.

We met people in urban and rural areas displaced by a dam, an iron-ore mine, canal widening, a ‘Smart City’, a shipping container terminal, and construction for the 2010 Commonwealth Games.

No matter what project displaced them, most displaced people we met with knew their rights and entitlements. But the power imbalance they were up against in demanding their rights was glaring.

Indeed, despite development projects often being in the pipeline for years before they commence, this does not always transpire to adequate notice for those who will be displaced. In Cochin and New Delhi, some families we met were cooking when bulldozers arrived to demolish their houses.

‘One day my house was bulldozed,’ said a woman displaced from a slum in New Delhi for land acquisitions and urban beautification in preparation for the 2010 Commonwealth Games.

Larger projects, such as the Chandil Dam in Jharkhand took over a decade to construct and another decade to reach capacity. Here, families had time to mentally prepare for their relocation, though it took years for the 12,000 people displaced to be resettled and receive compensation. 

NGOs and academics told us that neither the government nor the private sector collects data on people displaced by their projects after the project is completed. Only NGOs and academics hold such data on specific cases they work on.

Both the authorities and the private sector need to do much more to live up to their obligations to those displaced by development projects including: consulting and serving adequate notice and information about evictions; ensuring livelihood opportunities are accessible at or from resettlement sites; addressing IDPs’ protection and assistance needs related to their displacement.

Indeed, there is a need for all levels of government in India to respect and protect the rights of their citizens and ensure better safeguards for those internally displaced by development projects.