File picture of children studying as they continue with their protest against land acquisition at Gobindpur village.

Paradip, June 21: The Jagatsinghpur district administration today indefinitely put on hold the land acquisition process for the 12-million-tonne Posco steel plant.

“The dismantling of betel vineyards for land acquisition in Dhinkia gram panchayat has been suspended till further instructions. However, officials have gone ahead with other works such as, clearing the fruit-bearing trees from the project villages in two other gram panchayats,” said Paradip additional district magistrate Saroj Kanta Choudhury.

On the other hand, an official inquiry into the use of children in the anti-Posco resistance movement has hauled up the Posco Pratirodh Sangram Samity (PPSS), the anti-plant outfit, for violation of child rights.

“Children did not turn up voluntarily. Rather they were prompted by the Samity leaders. We have recorded the statement of some sections of parents. A section of children told us that the PPPS leaders forced our parents to join them in the movement,” said members of the inquiry committee. “The civil society groups also encouraged such blatant misuse of child rights as the children were made to lie on hot and sandy ground to form a human barricade against the land acquisition,” said Tilottama Das, a member of district child welfare committee.

The two-member probe team, during their visit to the project area villages under Dhinkia gram panchayat, found the village schools locked up.

As children were skipping classes, teachers had stayed away from the school.

“We interacted with parents and guardians. Most of them were reserved on their comments on this emotive issue. However, some of them confided that they were forced to take part in the stir,” said Kumudini Sahu, district social welfare officer, who headed the probe team.

PPSS president Abhaya Sahu, however, brushed aside the allegations and said: “The children were motivated as their parents are the worst sufferers due to land acquisition for the Posco plant.

“They had accompanied their parents and successfully stopped the land acquisition drive by staying on forefront of the human barricade.”

Choudhury said: “Using children as human shield is objectionable and unlawful. Nobody, including the parents, have the right to exploit the emotion of impressionable minds.”

However, in a further boost to the resistance movement, senior leaders of left parties, including CPI MP Gurudas Dasgupta and CPM MP Basudev Acharia, visited the project areas and iterated their stand for peaceful industrialisation.

“An insensitive Naveen Pattnaik is apparently hell bent on evicting unarmed people at gun point. We have come here to express solidarity with the voiceless people,” said Dasgupta.

Acharia said: “The left parties would take up the people’s fight to the floors of parliament. It’s disconcerting to note that the BJD government has emerged as a saviour of corporate interest while trampling down the livelihood of its own people.”

In a related development, leaders of the Posco Birodhi Jana Sangharsha Samiti, another anti-Posco outfit, announced that it would launch a satyagraha will be launched from July 5 in Bhubaneswar.

More than 100 activists from Orissa and 25 noted social activists, including Medha Patkar, Swami Agnivesh and others, would attend the satyagraha that will be staged near the Naveen Niwas, the official residence of chief minister Naveen Patnaik, said the Samiti leaders in Cuttack.