US Ex- Im Bank confirms serious labour rights violations at Reliance’s Sasan Power Project

(Srijan Lokhit Samiti, 9 February 2016) The Export Import Bank of the United States, a financer of Reliance’s Sasan Power Project in Madhya Pradesh, confirmed serious labour rights violations at the project, including 19 deaths. In the report “Report on Project Financing of Sasan Power Limited” dated September 2015, by the Office of Inspector General of the US governments's ExIm bank, it has been confirmed that Ex-Im Bank’s Chairman expressed his continued disappointment to the CEO of Reliance regarding the “poor safety” practices at the Project. In particular, the Chairman’s letter stated, “the number of all fatalities at the integrated Project is now 19 - which is both tragic and absolutely unacceptable.” Despite that, nothing changed on the ground. Most of these cases were not investigated, nor action taken against the Reliance for this serious lapses. Ex-Im Bank, despite expressing concerns about these cases, failed to take any action to ensure that such cases do not recur. A 15 October 2015 Los Angeles Times article also found that "the privately run Sasan power project — backed by hundreds of millions of dollars in U.S. government funding — has also generated land disputes, health and environmental concerns and financial hardship for villagers who say it has delivered little of what was promised."