DRP NB 021023: Why this culture of opaque governance around Joshimath?

October 2, 2023October 2, 2023 SANDRP1 Comment

(Feature Image: A temple collapses after the gradual ‘sinking’ of Joshimath in Chamoli district, on Jan. 08, 2023. PTI/HT)

It is clear that the Union and the Uttarakhand government did not want the reports prepared by different national institutes related to Joshimath Sinking, to be made public and the state High Court had to order it to do so. The government’s view of the report is clear from that. It took the judiciary so many months to finally order the report to be made public. What is it that the government wanted to hide? Why? From whom? Why is there this culture of opaque governance even in disaster management related issues? Is it growth fundamentalism that is driving the government as the single most factor? Or is it the arrogance and adamant attitude of the governance, not wanting to consider any questions raised against their decisions? Why is there so little faith in the people, society and transparent, accountable governance? Why is the judiciary allowing such a culture to prevail generally?

These are some of the key questions that arise from this and other such episodes.

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DRP News Bulletin

DRP NB 180923: Floodplain loss, the biggest in Asia, disaster in the making

September 18, 2023September 18, 2023 SANDRPLeave a comment

(Feature Image: Ongoing ghat work along Yamuna at Qudsia ghat, ISBT Dellhi. SANDRP, June 2023)

A floodplain, according to the US Federal Emergency Management Agency, is “any land area susceptible to being inundated by floodwaters from any source”. According to the report “Human alterations of the global floodplains 1992–2019”, over 460,000 sqkms of floodplain area was lost to agriculture, while another 140,000 sqkms was redeveloped to new areas over the existing floodplain. Continent-wise, Asia lost the biggest area of floodplains — a little over 200,000 sqkms — among all the continents. It was followed by South America (92,000 sqkms) and Africa (73,000 sqkms).

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DRP News Bulletin

DRP NB 110923: Another independent institution-CEC destroyed

September 11, 2023September 12, 2023 SANDRPLeave a comment

(Feature Image: Ramganga River near Marchula. SANDRP 08 Sept. 2023)

The Govt of India’s Sept 5 2023 notification reconstituting the Central Empowered Committee completely destroys the independent nature of this institution of accountability and course correction. This institution, set up by the Supreme Court in 2002 and reconstituted in 2008, worked as eyes and ears of the Supreme Court on environmental issues. The new committee has no independent members, it will be constituted by the MoEF, MoEF itself has such an abysmally poor track record.

The notification, reports said, diluted the CEC’s autonomy on four key counts: the committee will report to the ministry, instead of the SC; the ministry will pick all the members and the SC will have no role in the process; the ministry, and not the court, will fund the committee; the provision of having two NGOs in the committee has been done away with.

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DRP News Bulletin

DRP NB 04092023: Will National Ganga Mission too fail to clean up Ganga?

September 4, 2023September 4, 2023 SANDRPLeave a comment

(Feature Image: Untreated industrial effluents being dumped in Drain No. 6, Sonipat in May 2023.)

More than 7 years have passed since the central government launched Rs. 20, 000 crores Namami Gange Programme in May 2015 replacing Ganga Action Plan (GAP) and created National Mission for Clean Ganga (NMCG) a nodal agency to implement the programme.

The NMCG has already missed the target of cleaning the Ganga by 2019 and then by 2020 due to improper planning and Detailed Project Reports (DPRs) as accepted by G. Asok Kumar, Director General (DG), NMCG in an interview to The Week in January 2023 further extending the target to 2026.

Though Namami Gange aimed to adopt a basin wise approach with focus on e-flows, afforestation, revival of tributaries, biodiversity conservation in participatory manner; so far it has extensively worked on creation of sewage treatment infrastructures in the states along the main stem of the river.

Despite that the ground situation is far from improving as shown in the The Hindu report below which reveals that about 80 percent of the overall budget is being spent on sewage infrastructure creation and by 2026, the treatment plants capacity would be able to treat at the most 60 percent of sewage generated only along the main stem of the Ganga river.

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DRP News Bulletin

DRP NB 140823: A year after Karam dam disaster: people suffer, engineer set free, contractor building more dams

August 14, 2023January 3, 2024 SANDRPLeave a comment

(Feature Image: Breach in Karam dam, Madhya Pradesh. Source:- Social Media)

It was on Aug 13, 2022, a year ago when the Karam dam wall in Dhar district in Madhya Pradesh started leaking water. Two days later it collapsed. The people who suffered during the disaster continue to suffer. The engineers who were supposed to ensure proper construction of the dam, following all the norms, did not do that, were supposed to be suspended, but got reinstated elsewhere. They kept quiet in the courts. The black listed contractor continues to build more dams.

A clearer evidence of the nexus that supports unwanted, destructive, costly, corruption ridden and disastrous dams would be difficult to find. As the destruction due to dams and such other unaccountable infrastructure development plays out in Himachal Pradesh & elsewhere this year, the nexus that thrives on opaque, unaccountable and non-participatory governance continues to happily grow even as the changing rainfall patterns bring greater disasters before our eyes.

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Dams

DRP NB 070823: Forests & Biodiversity amendments: Gap between intent & application

August 7, 2023August 7, 2023 SANDRPLeave a comment

(Feature Image: Dense Dudhatoli forest range near Peethsain in Thalisain block of Pauri Garhwal. Feb. 2023/ SANDRP)

As editorial comments in two different national newspapers given below shows, the biodiversity and forest conservation amendment bills passed by the Parliament last week weaken the cause of biodiversity and forest conservation, when it is most pressingly required to strengthen them.

Both amendments pave the way for ease of doing business and reducing role of local communities, both in terms of legal norms and practical implications.

The need for conservation of these resources was never more urgent than now considering the impacts of climate change on them and their importance for not only livelihood security of vast millions, but also for hydrological implications, food security, protection against increasing frequency and intensity of disasters, but also for adaptation in the context of changing climate. We hope against hope that better sense will prevail sooner rather than later to ensure the amendments do not lead to destruction of forest and biodiversity resources.

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DRP News Bulletin

DRP NB 260623: National Framework for Sediment Management

June 26, 2023June 26, 2023 SANDRPLeave a comment

A National Framework for Sediment Management is certainly a long standing requirement and any move in that direction would have been welcome. Not only because the sediment accumulation destroys storage capacity of India’s Dams, created at such massive costs. But also because sediment is an integral part of river flow and also very important for the rivers to stop or reduce erosion at deltas. There are other issues related to sediment including creation and disposal of toxic sediment and impact of sediment free water flowing downstream from the hydropower projects.

But we need much more serious and sincere efforts in this direction than what has been suggested in following government press release. The movement on such an important subject is so snail paced, half hearted, non-comprehensive, unscientific and non-sincere that it is not clear how this is going to help.

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DRP News Bulletin

DRP NB 190623: Ten years of Uttarakhand Flood disaster

June 19, 2023June 20, 2023 SANDRP1 Comment

(Feature Image: Thousands of people have been rescued but the inability of rescue teams to navigate disaster-struck areas has left over 60,000 people stranded in Uttarakhand. The Hindu, 19 June 2013)

This week marks ten years since the Uttarakhand flood disaster of June 2013, the worst recorded disaster in the state. The deaths and destruction in the disaster were unprecedented. Large parts of the deaths and destruction were due to man-made causes. Climate Change played its anthropogenic role too as the unprecedented rainfall happened even before the monsoon was set in. Even the Supreme Court took suo motu cognizance of the disaster and ordered halt to all hydropower projects and independent review of them. One of the major human causes that worsened the disaster was the lack of credible disaster prevention and management systems.

One expected that we and particularly our all powerful governments in the state and the Centre would learn lessons from such an unprecedented, such a massive destructive disaster. The first step to that would have been credible reporting of what exactly happened during the disaster, which agencies played what role and how the destruction could have been reduced. That such a report does not exist even today says a lot.

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DRP News Bulletin

DRP NB 120623: Tip of Karnataka irrigation scam?

June 12, 2023June 14, 2023 SANDRPLeave a comment

(Feature Image: A decade old Amul caricature on Rs. 70, 000 crore irrigation scam in Maharashtra.)

It’s not very frequent that irrigation scams come to light. Somewhat inadvertently, the Karnataka irrigation scam seems to be getting exposed when the newly elected state government stopped two irrigation projects in the constituency of the irrigation minister of the previous state government, the Gatti Basavanna Dam and the Ammajeshwari Lift Irrigation Project. In both cases, the department officials are saying that they prepared the project reports based on instructions from above. In both cases, the costs proposed at one stage were 3 to 9 times higher than the revised estimated cost.

One only hopes that the government, media and the judiciary will go to the bottom of these revelations and bring to light the full dimensions of what seems like a tip of the Karnataka Irrigation Scam. It is public knowledge that Karnataka has been spending tens of thousands of crores each of the last few years in the name of big irrigation or dam projects, without commensurate benefits.

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DRP News Bulletin

DRP NB 220523: Water Options as we await South West Monsoon 2023

May 22, 2023May 22, 2023 SANDRPLeave a comment

(Feature Image: Waster Chest nut cultivators removing weeds from Giri Taal of Kashipur. April 2023)

As we await the onset of South West Monsoon 2023, we would like to highlight the water options stories in lead story here, that includes examples from Ladakh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Gujarat, Chennai, among others. It is important to remember these as we need to be ready to welcome and nourish the coming annual bounty that monsoon brings.

It also reminds us the fascination our poets have for this season, particularly the wonderment that Gulzar keeps expressing. In this one of his non filmy poetry “Baarish” he warns:

“Mujhko ye fikr, ke is baar bhi sailab ka paani…

Kud ke utrega kohsahr se jab..

tod ke le jayega ye kachhe kinaare..”

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