PYQ Vault · Paper 1 · Social Movements
Critically analyse the environmentalist movement in Tuticorin, Tamil Nadu.
How the answer moves
The flow snapshot — the routes in, the body, the counter-view and the routes out.
Flow snapshot — how the answer moves
Intro routes
| RP Locate the movement → grassroots environmental-justice struggle against Sterlite Copper routes (Vedanta), Thoothukudi -. resistance since the 1990s, peaked 2018 → demand = closure over pollution and health. | R2 Frame as a poor-community struggle defending livelihood and health against a polluting plant the state had cleared where others refused.
Body flow
Grievance documented — NEERI report 2011 (copper, lead, cadmium, fluoride in groundwater) + flow 2013 gas leak → CSE: three states rejected the plant first + faulty EIA —. state cleared what others refused (governance failure) → popular base: fisher folk, Dalits, small farmers, women, church groups, students; women as moral voices —. social media mobilised 100,000+, challenged official narratives → TNPCB clearance rejected but construction continued → police firing, eleven dead → environmental justice tied to democratic rights → Sahu: reinforcing Swaraj and democracy.
Counter-view
Narain’s fire-fighting critique → closure achieved, development model left untouched → weak “iam © environmental governance persists.
Conclusion routes
R1 A real victory for environmental justice and an exposure of governance failure, but bounded by routes an unchanged development model. | R2 | Success and limit are the same fact.. one plant closed, the paradigm that breeds such conflicts intact.
Model answer
Handwritten, in the form it would be written in the examination hall.
