Mining activities should not displace self-sufficient people and force them into a life of dependencyEvery evening, after 8pm, the road to Keonjhar in the north-east Indian state of Orissa is jammed with hundreds of gaily painted lorries taking the mineral wealth of that impoverished state to Paradeep, the nearest port, and out into the world.If Vedanta Resources goes ahead with its plan to build an open cast mine on the top of the beautiful Niyamgiri mountain the lorries that carry the bauxite away will probably join that queue. The problems for the Dongria Kondh, who live a simple life there, are likely to remain. Whatever promises of education and health the mining company has made, the people don't want it and have been fighting it for a long time.They are part of a much wider battle over mineral rights in this state of 38 million. On the one hand, it is one of the poorest – where 55% of children are malnourished and literacy rates are 13% for men and 7% for women, much lower than most other parts of India. On the other, it holds 20% of all the mineral wealth in India and mining companies from around the world come to take it out. But the manner of their removal leaves deep scars on the landscapes and the people who live there, most of whom are marginal farmers who rely for part of the year on collecting jackfruit and mangos to sell in the villages. Other hill tribes are affected by mining too. In the past, the Bhuiya, the Munda, the Juang and Santal communities lived in self-sufficiency in the hills above Keonjhar, and now all are facing difficulties.Mining activities which can change or stem the course of a river, which may leave it polluted, can turn a self-sufficient community into a dependent one. When I visited the area last year with Concern, a charity which, along with Action Aid and others, supports the battle of the Kondh people, I was taken to a settlement built by a mining company for a displaced community. There were foreign guards in the street ...