Convention held in reply to AIIB’s failure to hear people’s voice

MUMBAI: Ahead of the third annual meeting of Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), a group of people gathered in Mumbai, to show resentment against the authorities for not including the voices of the people in the meeting. This three-day (from June 21-23, 2018) convention in response to AIIB meeting commenced on Thursday. A large group of people from across the country, gathered in YB Chavan auditorium for the inaugural address of ‘People’s Convention on Infrastructure Financing: A response to AII meeting. This gathering plans to discuss various social, environmental and other implications infrastructure development will have on people and their livlihood. Talking about AIIB’s meeting, senior activist Medha Patkar said, “During such meeting, people’s representation is needed. If they fail to invite us for the AIIB meeting (held on June 24 to 26, 2018), we will still go ahead and protest in front of the venue.” She also added that in the next three days, there will various workshops that will be held in order to bring forth the issues faced by the people during such infrastructure projects. Adding to it, Ulka Mahajan from Soshit Jan Andolan said, “We want AIIB to focus on public health infrastructure. Here the focus is on only building roads and having bullet trains. Such development is of no use if the public health infrastructure is in shambles.” She also pointed out that people need to bring into the attention of experts of international bodies that the Indian government is changing laws to suit such infrastructure projects. -Staff Reporter