World Bank set up the Morse Committee to conduct an independent review of the Sardar Sarovar Project.  The Committee visited the Narmada valley villages and came up with a scathing 300-400 page report published as a book in 1992.  These are the extracts from the report.  The Report led to the withdrawal of the World Bank from Sardar Sarovar and other dams on the Narmada.

Extracts from "SARDAR SAROVAR" The  Report of the Independent Review (Morse Committee) Chapter 17

FINDINGS AND RECOMMENDATIONS 

We have completed an assessment of resettlement and environmental aspects of the Sardar Sarovar Projects. In this chapter we draw together the findings of cur review, already explained in the preceding chapters, and set forth the recommendations which, in our judgment, are appropriate to these findings.

THE FINDINGS 

Resettlement and Rehabilitation
* The Bank and India both failed to carry out adequate assessments of human impacts of the Sardar Sarovar Projects. Many of the difficulties that have beset implementation of the Projects have their origin in this failure.* There was virtually no basis, in 1985, on which to determine what the impacts were that would have to be ameliorated. This led to an inadequate understanding of the nature and scale of resettlement.* This inadequate understanding was compounded by a failure to consult the people potentially to be affected.* Failure to consult the people has resulted in opposition to the Projects, on the part of potentially affected people, supported by activists. This opposition has created great obstacles to successful implementation.* In drafting the terms and conditions of the 1985 credit and loan agreements, the Bank failed to take adequate account of the fact that a large proportion of those at risk from the development of the Sardar Sarovar Projects are tribal people. This meant that insufficient account was taken of the principles enshrined in the Bank's 1982 Operational Manual Statement outlining its policies regarding tribal people.* In these and other ways, the Bank failed to follow the principles and policies it set out in 1980 and 1982. In addition, the Bank's overarching principle embodied in the 1985 credit and loan agreements by which resettlement and rehabilitation were to be judged, namely that oustees improve or at least regain their standard of living as quickly as possible, was not consistently advanced or insisted upon with sufficient force or commitment.* The Bank failed to consider the effects of the Projects on people living downstream of the dam. We recommend that the Bank develop a policy to deal with the plight of persons affected downstream. They may not come within the rubric of resettlement, but their situation should be addressed.* As a result of both the inadequate database and the failure to incorporate provisions of the Bank's policies in the 1985 credit and loan agreements, the provisions for resettlement and rehabilitation do not adequately address the real needs of those to be affected.* In particular, the agreements allowed a distinction between "landed" and "landless" oustees which failed to recognize the realities of life in the submergence villages.* Similarly, the rights of encroachers were not acknowledged. The only way of implementing resettlement policy, at least in the case of the Sardar Sarovar Projects, in a way that restores oustees' previous standard of living is by provision of adequate land. This is of special relevance to the oustees of Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh.* The people of the six villages affected by construction and development of Kevadia Colony were not appropriately and adequately compensated. The Bank failed to ensure that this be done as required by the 1985 agreements. We recommend that the Bank require India to provide land for the families of the six villages, with an adjustment for cash compensation received in the interim, as appropriate.* Relocation and resettlement of the people of the rock-filled dyke villages was implemented in a way that meant that the Bank's overarching principle of resettlement and rehabilitation, i.e., that no one should suffer a fall in standard of living, was not likely to be achieved.* The Bank failed to ensure that those affected by construction of the canal and irrigation system would be entitled to resettlement benefits.* We recommend that the Bank should use its good offices to ensure that Gujarat provides resettlement benefits to canal-affected persons, especially those farmers who are rendered marginal or landless.* The policies of the riparian states failed to anticipate the needs of major sons, and adopted what we regard as an unduly restrictive interpretation of the Tribunal award's provision for major sons. Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh continue to maintain this interpretation and provide inadequate benefits to major sons of landed families.* In 1987-88 the Government of Gujarat expanded its resettlement and rehabilitation policies to provide two hectares of irrigable land to all oustees, including the landless, encroachers, and major sons. This represented a policy package that came nearer than any thus far set out anywhere in India to establishing a basis for successful resettlement.* Despite Gujarat's improved policy, Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh continued to limit the provision of two hectares of land to "landed" oustees. This means encroachers and major sons (including the major sons of landed oustees) are not entitled to benefits in their own states that meet the Bank's overarching principle of resettlement and rehabilitation. The proportion of oustees thus vulnerable to a reduced standard of living is at least 6o per cent.* The disparity between Gujarat's policy and the policies of Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh has meant that oustees' right to choose between relocation in Gujarat and their own state has been rendered meaningless.  * Implementation of resettlement in Madhya Pradesh has been limited by policy deficiencies, inadequate institutional commitment, continuing failure of consultation, and limited availability of suitable resettlement land.* This state of affairs in Madhya Pradesh has produced a situation in which, even if Madhya Pradesh were to adopt a policy with benefits equal to Gujarat's, such a policy could not now be implemented, given the time necessary to meet the requirements of the Sardar Sarovar Projects.* Resettlement of oustees in Gujarat has entailed a scattering of families and villages among many different sites. This is in part a result of choices made by oustees. It is also a result of inadequate land at resettlement sites to accommodate all oustees who wish to have land there. This has contributed to some separation of families, especially in the case of oustees from the rock filled dyke villages. Gujarat is unlikely to be able to resettle a large proportion of oustees from Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh. Even if land were available for relocation sites, resettlement and rehabilitation at these sites presents major problems. The record of resettlement and rehabilitation in India, which has been unsatisfactory in virtually every project with a large resettlement component, should reasonably have prompted the Bank to adopt a less flexible standard for resettlement and rehabilitation of project-affected people. In this context, the Bank's incremental strategy to obtain compliance, made explicit in 1989, greatly undermines prospects for achieving successful resettlement and rehabilitation.

ENVIRONMENT

* Measures to anticipate and mitigate environmental impact were not properly considered in the design of the Projects because of a lack of basic data and consultation with the affected people. * The Bank's appraisal took no account of the fact that environmental clearance in India was not forthcoming in 1983 from the Ministry of Environment and Forests because of insufficient information.* Under the 1985 credit and loan agreements, the Bank required an environmental workplan to be developed by the end of 1985, later extended to 1989. It is still not available, resulting in a disjointed, piecemeal approach to environmental planning that is both inefficient and ineffective. * In 1987 India's environmental clearance for the Projects was given, despite `the fact that the information required prior to the Projects' clearance was unavailable. In order to overcome this deficiency, studies were to be conducted pari faassu with construction. The clearance was conditional on completion of these basic studies by 1989. Most remain to be completed. We believe that the ,bari passu policy greatly undermines the prospects for achieving environmental protection. * Significant discrepancies in the hydrological data and analyses indicate that the Sardar Sarovar' Projects will not perform as planned either with or without the upstream Narmada Sagar Projects. A realistic operational analysis of the Projects upon which to base an impact assessment has not been done.* The cumulative impacts of the Sardar Sarovar Projects together with the related upstream developments, especially the Narmada Sagar Projects, are very likely to be far reaching, yet they have not been studied * The afforestation and catchment area treatment programs proposed upstream are unlikely to succeed within the timetable of the Projects because of the lack of consultation with, and participation of, villagers in the affected areas. * The compensatory afforestation approach being taken by Gujarat in Kutchch, if continued, will lead to a steady decline in the quality of forests. The practice of replanting marginal forest lands in substitution for better lands that will be submerged, means that the forests will be diminished in value.* The impact associated with the backwater effect of sedimentation in the upper reaches of the reservoir has not been considered. Our assessment has concluded that it will be significant. * The downstream ecological implications of dam construction have not been considered. Important but limited data have only recently begun to be collected. The downstream impacts are likely to be significant, including severe losses to, if not the elimination of, the last important hilsa fishery in western India.

* There has been no comprehensive environmental assessment of the canal and water delivery system in the command area. Information we have gathered leads us to believe that there will be serious problems with waterlogging and salinity. We also found that many of the assumptions used in project design and for the development of mitigative measures are suspect. * Despite the stated priority of delivery of drinking water, there were no plans available for review. * The existing threat from malaria within the command area is serious. The Projects have been designed and executed without appropriate safeguards. The failure to adopt measures to reduce the likelihood of the spread of malaria illustrates the breakdown between assurances offered by the Bank and India and the reality on the ground: We recommend that the Bank use its good offices to ensure that preventive measures are taken as a matter of urgency to address the public health problems posed by water-borne diseases in the Projects area. * The newly proposed Narmada Basin Development Project, although it appears to address some of the problems highlighted in our review, fails to address key issues, many of which are the same as have caused problems with the Sardar Sarovar Projects. Although some specific elements have merit, the Basin Development Project adopts a piecemeal approach, falling far short of the work that the Bank's own missions have said is needed for proper basin development. The implications of Narmada Sagar for basin development are overlooked. *Bank requirements that the Basin Development Project not entail forced relocation and proceed on the basis of a participatory approach to forest management and catchment area treatment, as proposed, are laudable but unrealistic, given the hostility towards the Projects in the region and the time frames envisaged by the Projects.

THE BANK

We have made findings that reveal a failure to incorporate Bank policies into the 1985 credit and loan agreements and subsequent failure to require adherence to enforceable provisions of these agreements. Much of what has gone wrong with Sardar Sarovar Projects is the result of such failures over a range of resettlement and rehabilitation and environmental matters.
How did this happen?
It is apparent that there has been, and continues to be, deep concern among Bank officers and staff that India should have the means to enhance agricultural production. The Sardar Sarovar Projects were seen as offering enormous benefits, especially in terms of delivery of drinking water and irrigation. There developed an eagerness on the part of the Bank and India to get on with the job. Both, it seems, were prepared to ease, or even disregard, Bank policy and India's regulations and procedures dealing with resettlement and environmental protection in the hope of achieving the much-needed benefits.
Experience worldwide, in developed as well as developing countries, has shown that by factoring in and allowing for human and environmental considerations at the outset, projects can be substantially improved. To be effective, resettlement and environmental planning must be integrated into the design of projects; Otherwise they become costly and burdensome add-ons.
These considerations lead to an examination of issues that focus on the Bank itself. Our work in conducting the independent review has encouraged us to make a number of observations which may be of value.
Embedded in the World Bank's operational directives is a resolve to establish ex ante project assessment. This requires an investment by the Bank of time and money and personnel with appropriate expertise, with on-the-ground studies and consultation as part of the planning of a project.
There should be a review of Bank procedures to ensure that the full reach of the Bank's policies is being implemented. The Bank should establish whether the problems we have found in the case of Sardar Sarovar are at issue in other projects in India and elsewhere. Our findings on this project may well indicate a need on the part of the Bank to strengthen quality control.
THE PROJECTS The Terms of Reference provided that our assessment should include, as appropriate, recommendations for improvement of implementation. The absence of proper impact assessments and the paucity of undisputed data have limited our ability confidently to make project-specific recommendations of the kind that were contemplated. We have limited ourselves to recommendations with respect to the Kevadia villagers, the canal oustees, downstream policy, and the protection of public health, that should be carried through regardless of the fate of the Projects.

Our findings indicate that the Sardar Sarovar Projects are beset by profound difficulties. These difficulties have their genesis in the earliest phase of the Bank's involvement in the Projects, for they turn on the absence of an adequate database and failure to consult with the people whose lives and environment were and continue to be affected.

Lack of data meant that the Bank was not able, in the early 1980s, to appraise the Projects properly. No one is sure about the impacts of the reservoir and the canal on either people or the land. Without knowing what impacts were likely to be, we found it difficult to the point of impossibility to assess measures by which they might be mitigated; much of our work has therefore been devoted to gathering our own limited information base.

People who live in the villages and depend on the resources of the valley should have played a central part in determining the Projects' impact. Both their knowledge and their vulnerabilities are integral to any understanding of what is at issue. At the same time, failure to consult has fuelled intense opposition to the Projects which, as we have pointed out, has itself become a serious obstacle to design and implementation of mitigative measures.

These factors-absence of adequate data, failure of consultation, and hostility towards the Projects in the Narmada Valley-bear on every aspect of implementation. Our Terms of Reference invite us to recommend measures to improve implementation. It seems to us that the essential condition, the very starting point of any such recommendation, requires that these underlying difficulties be addressed.
But the underlying difficulties-the failures that reach back to the origin of the Projects-cannot be overcome by a patchwork of studies. The limited information base which we constructed is inadequate for the purpose. Nor is it a question of applying more intense pressure to Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh in order to secure improved resettlement policies. As we say, the difficulties are profound. The Bank's incremental strategy and India's pari fiassu policy, adopted to deal with resettlement and environmental problems, have for the most part failed. A further application of the same strategy, albeit in a more determined or aggressive form, would also fail. As long as implementation continues in these ways, problems will be compounded rather than mitigated.

Absence of human and environmental assessment ab initio creates the impression that the demands of engineering carry far more weight in the Bank than the needs of the people to be affected or of the environment. The Bank's incremental strategy (and the Bank's concurrence in India's pari passu policy) strengthen this impression. Readiness to bear with non-compliance thereafter confirms it.

DECISIONS as to the future of the Sardar Sarovar Projects and the Bank's participation in them are within the exclusive domains of India and the Bank. But implementation of the Projects requires measures that go to the heart of the problems in which the resettlement and environmental components of the Sardar Sarovar Projects have become mired. We have been at pains in the section of this chapter summarizing our findings to demonstrate how those problems of human and environmental impact encompass all aspects of the Projects, including the uncertainties of hydrology, the upstream questions, the impact downstream, the command area issues, the health risks, the deficiencies in resettlement policy and implementation in each of the three states as well-as the canal. None of these issues can be ignored.  It seems to us that the matters we have raised are fundamental. It would be prudent if the necessary studies were done and the data made available for informed decision-making before further construction takes place. Implementation requires that the Bank take a step back. Otherwise, the possibility of making sound decisions will be further compromised.  Little can be achieved while construction continues. What would a step back achieve? First, it would afford an opportunity to design the kinds of human and environmental impact studies that are still needed. Second, it would permit the assessment of the results of such studies, to see whether modifications of the Projects might be in order. Third, it would provide a chance to consider what resettlement and rehabilitation policies might meet the needs of the oustees, and how these could be implemented in a way that is consistent with the Bank's policies and principles as set out in its Operational Manuals and Directives.      Even though proponents describe Sardar Sarovar as the most studied and least implemented project in India, we do not agree. The Projects may well be the most talked about in India, but the fact is that their human and environmental consequences have not been studied, and their engineering, design, and operation would profit from further analysis.   There is a need to consider Sardar Sarovar in the social and environmental context of the Narmada valley as a whole, to consult, inform, and involve the people affected by the Projects throughout the Narmada valley, those affected in the command area, and those living downstream. The opposition, especially in the submergence area, has ripened into hostility. So long as this hostility endures, progress will be impossible except as a result of unacceptable means.A way must be found to rebuild confidence, to demonstrate goodwill, and to send out an unambiguous message that the Bank continues to be committed to its principles and its policies.
REFLECTIONS In the case of the Sardar Sarovar Projects, India has bound itself to meet standards   for resettlement  and rehabilitation more exacting than any it had agreed to in the pact.     If we expect perfect justice in an imperfect world it cannot be obtained. There is no doubt that in the national interest, people can be 'required to resettle. However, India, in conformity with the development of international standards of human rights, has subscribed to certain minimum conditions that must be observed even when the national interest is involved. They reflect the inalienable human rights of the oustees. We believe that these norms must be adhered to.       Nor do we insist upon an unattainable standard in environmental impact assessment and mitigation. However, to construct the Sardar Sarovar Projects, India has availed itself of world-class engineering technology. Should it settle for less than adequate standards in the application of social and environmental science?    We are aware of the statement in the eleventh principle of the Rio Declaration presented to the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development:
         Standards applied by some countries may be inappropriate and of unwarranted economic and social cost to other countries, in particular developing countries.
           But the environmental standards for the Sardar Sarovar Projects were established by India itself. On the resettlement side, standards were determined by the Narmada Water Disputes Tribunal and agreed to by India and the states in the credit and loan agreements.    We have felt obliged to illuminate what we think are flaws in the Sardar Sarovar Projects. It should not be thought that these would only be found in India or confined to the Sardar Sarovar Projects. The fragile assumptions which have supported this project can be found elsewhere. Failure to consider the human rights of the displaced and failure to consider environmental impacts occur in the development of megaprojeets in both developed and developing countries.     If the human rights obligations identified by International Labor Organization Convention Io'7 and in Bank policy are acknowledged and respected, if the commitment to the environment is real, and if these are properly integrated into project design at the outset, more effective and equitable develop ment will ensue. Some believe that these requirements make it more difficult, often more costly, to build megaprojects like Sardar Sarovar. This implies that human and environmental costs are to be heavily discounted in project planning and execution. But hard lessons from the past have taught us that this is unacceptable. In some cases it may be that alternatives to projects that cause compulsory relocation on a large scale or severe environmental impact may have to be sought.    We have found it difficult to separate our assessment of resettlement and rehabilitation and environmental protection from a consideration of the Sardar Sarovar Projects as a whole. The issues of human and environmental impact bear on virtually every aspect of large-scale development projects. Ecological realities must be acknowledged, and unless a project can be carried out in accordance with existing norms of human rights-norms espoused and endorsed by the Bank and many borrower countries-the project ought not to proceed.     The Bank must ensure that in projects it decides to support the principles giving priority to resettlement and environmental protection are faithfully observed-This is the only basis for truly sustainable development.