Development and Displacement: The Case of an Opencast Coal Mining Project in Orissa

Based on an empirical study of a coal mining project in a tribal district of Orissa, India, this paper focuses on the extent to which displaced people benefit from the policies purportedly designed to help them, by underlining the contradictory role of the state, which, while simultaneously trying to moderate exclusion through its resettlement policies, systematically seeks to deny them agency and freedom.