Anti-dam activist rejects Arunachal government’s invitation for talks, says time for negotiations is over

AASU has threatened to launch a massive agitation in protest against the move to build more big dams in Arunachal Pradesh. File

Katon Moyong, popularly known as ‘Abor Man’ and a prominent voice opposing the proposed 11,200-MW hydropower project in the Siang valley of Arunachal Pradesh, has rejected the State government’s offer of talks, saying the time for negotiations has passed.

The engineer-turned-activist, whom the Delhi Police detained recently for protesting the project in the national capital, dismissed the government’s national security argument for building the dam on the Siang river as an attempt to overcome public resistance.

The Siang Upper Multipurpose Project (SUMP), one of the biggest hydropower projects planned in the north-eastern State, envisages the construction of a large dam across the Siang. It will be executed by the National Hydroelectric Power Corporation.

The project has been facing stiff resistance from the Adi community, particularly in the Siang region, over concerns about the displacement of people, the submergence of ancestral lands and forests, and the impact on their cultural and ecological heritage.

The Arunachal Pradesh government has said the project is primarily aimed at storing and managing water in the Siang basin, particularly in view of concerns over China’s proposed mega dam on the river upstream.

Mr. Moyong said the Adi community’s position against the dam remained unchanged, alleging that the government’s push for the project was politically motivated, with an eye on the 2029 Assembly elections. He appealed to the indigenous communities of Arunachal Pradesh to remain united against the project, and cautioned them against “attempts to divide” different tribes over the issue.

“The time for discussion on the SUMP has passed,” he told a press conference at the Arunachal Press Club in Itanagar on Thursday (November 5, 2026). “Let there be dams on smaller rivers, but not on the Siang. Either the entire Adi community will have to be exterminated to build the Siang dam, or there will be no Siang dam.”

Mr. Moyong claimed the first proposal for a dam on the Siang was introduced in 1979 under the banner of Brahmaputra flood control, but was rejected by the Adi community. He blamed the government of the late Chief Minister Dorjee Khandu for signing 145 memoranda of understanding (MoUs) with power developers and private companies, which he alleged had pushed the State into a huge debt burden.

Successive governments changed the justification for the project over the years, describing it as a flood mitigation initiative, a project of national interest and a national project, before the present government began promoting it as a national security imperative, he claimed.

Protesters have been demanding an immediate stop to the continuing Pre-Feasibility Report (PFR) activities and survey work for the project. They have also sought the withdrawal of security forces deployed in areas likely to be affected.

The government, however, has maintained that the 11,000-MW project would drive economic and social growth, generate employment and self-employment opportunities for youth, and strengthen water and energy security for the State and the nation.

water / Environmental disasters / Arunachal Pradesh