Shramik Mukti Dal

Shramik Mukti Dal (toilers’ liberation league) is a socio-political organization in Maharashtra, India. It is an organization working in eleven districts of Maharashtra, organizing farmers and toilers on issues of drought, dam and project eviction, and caste oppression. The Shramik Mukti Dal (SMD) follows an ideology not simply based on Marxism but on Marx-Phule-Ambedkarism.[1][2]

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SMD has been instrumental in waging a movement for water rights for more than two decades.[3] Much of development was uncontrolled, rapacious excavation of sand from riverbeds for the construction industry in drought-prone areas of Western Maharashtra, which had led to the drying up of the wells in the nearby farms. SMD along with local communities, socially committed ecological engineers, science-activists and other activists, progressive intellectuals, and media people led a prolonged, successful struggle to stop this unlimited excavation of this sand and built the Baliraja dam.[4] This idea came out of detailed discussions with the people of the villages -Balawadi and Tandulwadi on the two sides of the river Yerala. The idea was that people in the villages will receive preferential right to excavate a limited amount of sand in the river in their village, sell it after paying due royalty to the government. This money financed finance the Baliraja dam, which helped eliminate the effects drought in these two villages.[5]

Some of the leading members include Bharat Patankar (President and Full-time Organizer], Waharu Sonawane[6](Vice President and well-known Adivasi poet and activist), Sampat Desai (National Organizer), Indutai Patankar, Gail Omvedt, Mukti Sadhna (Shramik Muktiwadi Yuva Sanghatna), Rahul Savita (Shramik Muktiwadi Yuva Sanghatna), Shailesh Sawant (Shramik Muktiwadi Yuva Sanghatna).

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  1. ^ Omvedt, Gail (November 1992). Reinventing Revolution: New Social Movements and the Socialist Tradition in India. M E Sharpe Inc. pp. 238–240. ISBN 0873327853.
  2. ^ Deshpande, Alok (25 August 2021). "Researcher, author Gail Omvedt passes away". The Hindu. Archived from the original on 25 August 2021. Retrieved 15 October 2022.
  3. ^ Phadke, Anant (1993). "Mobilisation against Communalism in South Maharashtra". Economic and Political Weekly (1142–1143).
  4. ^ Phadke, Anant (April 22, 1989). "A People's Dam". Economic and Political Weekly.
  5. ^ Phadke, Anant (1992). "Left Response to Drought in Maharashtra". Economic and Political Weekly: 253–254.
  6. ^ "Adivasi Movements in India: An Interview with Poet Waharu Sonavane". towardfreedom.com/. Archived from the original on 2022-10-15.