India’s Wetlands 2016: Encroached and Polluted

February 2, 2017February 9, 2017 SANDRP2 Comments

In the picture-Drying Wular lake in J&K; Mass dish death due to pollution in Ulsoor Lake, Karnataka; Filling up of Wetlands in Maharashtra and Waste dumping on Deepor Beel in Assam

Wetlands are vital for human survival. They are among the world’s most productive eco systems [1]. Wetlands are crucial for the survival of variety of plants and animals. They are indispensable for the countless services ranging from freshwater supply, food, sustainable livelihood options and groundwater recharge. They also host a huge variety of life, protect our coastlines, provide natural sponges against river flooding and store carbon to regulate climate change.

Here is an account on status of India’s wetland in 2016 underlining their ecological importance and urgent need of conservation of Wetlands across the country.

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WORLD WETLANDS DAY 2017: Man made Disaster for Wetlands that protect us from Disasters

February 2, 2017February 2, 2017 SANDRP3 Comments

The World Wetlands Day, celebrated around the world on 2^nd February each year, marks the adoption of Ramsar Convention on Wetlands in Iran in 1972. The Convention came into force in India since 1982. The theme for this year’s World Wetlands Day is “Wetlands for Disaster Risk Reduction.”[i]

During floods, wetlands can act as natural sponges and absorb intense runoff and discharge, holding more water than most soil types.[ii] This role of wetlands has been demonstrated most powerfully in India in the past few years. Chennai deluge in Nov-Dec 2015 highlighted what happens when wetlands in a city reduce by 2/3rds in just 20 years. Similarly, Kashmir valley lost 50% of its riverine wetlands in just over 30 years, which was one of the main reasons behind the extensive losses during the Sept 2014 Jhelum floods, as corroborated by Dr Asam Rahmani of Bombay Natural History Society (BNHS)[iii]. In 40 years, Bangalore has lost 79% of its wetlands, similar is the case with Mumbai, Hyderabad, Kolkata and New Delhi. Bhopal, a city of relatively sloping profile, faced floods twice in 2016, and wetlands, including the rivers in the city are facing existential risks in terms of encroachments[iv].

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Dams · DRP News Bulletin

DRP News Bulletin 30 Jan 2017 (After 31 years, SC transfers Ganga case to NGT without achieving clean river)

January 30, 2017 SANDRPLeave a comment

People walking on the bank of Ganga in Allahabad

SC transfers PIL on cleaning Ganga to NGT In a major development, after monitoring Ganga cleaning work for last 31 years and without achieving any cleaner river, the Supreme Court on January 24, 2017 wrapped up a PIL on cleaning of river Ganga and sent it to the National Green Tribunal (NGT) for more effective adjudication. The apex court had been monitoring the issue for 31 years. A bench of Chief Justice J S Khehar and Justice N V Ramana said that since issues relating to municipal solid waste and industrial waste were already being heard by the NGT on a day-to-day basis, all other issues relating to sources of polluting the river should also be heard by the NGT.

The bench said that the tribunal will be required to submit an interim report to it every six months, only to give an idea about the progress made and difficulties, if any. It also granted liberty to the petitioner, environmentalist M C Mehta, to approach the court if he had any grievances in consonance with the law.

During last week hearing (January 17, 2017), the SC bench has directed the government to file a report on the construction and functioning of STPs alongside the river, which runs through five States.

It has been almost two years after the SC has voiced scepticism about the government’s self-proclaimed promise to clean up the Ganga River. Before this, in 2014, the apex court had voiced its reservations about the various efforts over the decades to return the Ganga to its pristine self, once even saying that it “does not expect Ganga to be cleaned up even after 200 years.”

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Dams · DRP News Bulletin

DRP News Bulletin 23 Jan. 2017 (Unjustified Ken-Betwa Link Costs: Bundelkhand To Gain Nothing, Panna To Lose Its Tigers)

January 24, 2017January 24, 2017 SANDRP1 Comment

SANDRP Blog Little for Bundelkhand, lot for contractors in Ken Betwa river-link The official executive summary of the Detailed Project Report of KBLRP on NWDA website says: “The main objective of the Ken-Betwa link project is to make available water to water deficit areas of upper Betwa basin through substitution from the surplus waters of Ken basin.” Upper Betwa basin (Raisen and Vidisha districts of MP) is not in Bundelkhand. So KBLRP is essentially facilitating export of water from drought prone Bundelkhand to area outside Bundelkhand, which, in fact is well endowed with over 900 mm of average annual rainfall.

The DPR further says, a third o the surplus water will be utilized for “enroute irrigation of 0.60 lakh ha. in the districts of Tikamgarh and Chhatarpur of MP and Mahoba & Jhansi of U.P.” The claim in the minutes of Expert Appraisal Committee meeting of Dec 30, 2016 that “It is proposed to provide irrigation facility in 6,35,661 ha of area in Panna, Chhatarpur, Tikamgarh Districts of Madhya Pradesh and Banda, Mahoba and Jhansi Districts in Uttar Pradesh” needs to be put in context here. Firstly, this claim is far in excess of what the presumed surplus water can irrigate.

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Dams · DRP News Bulletin

DRP News Bulletin 16 Jan. 2017 (MoEF’s Expert Committee Shows Anti-People, Anti-Environment Biases)

January 16, 2017November 22, 2017 SANDRPLeave a comment

EAC against entertaining ‘anti-development’ representations The expert appraisal committee (EAC) on river valley and hydel projects of the Union Environment Ministry has decided “not to take any cognizance of such representations” received by its members. In its Dec. 30, 2016 meeting, the committee concluded that once a project proposal reaches the EAC for appraisal, it has crossed the stage of public consultation and “the EAC should not go back in time, and should not reopen it, by entertaining unsubstantiated representations received from the people”.

The EAC noted that in case of any clarification regarding action taken on such representations under the RTI Act, the EAC prescribed that a standard reply “action has been taken in accordance with the decisions taken in the 1st meeting of the EAC for River Valley and HEP on 30.12.2016” should suffice. “It was also felt that many of the objections raised are repetitive. Many such kind of representations have an anti-development attitude so that the projects are kept on hold or delayed. This has financial implications to the developers in particular and to the nation in general.

The committee emphasized that relevant ministries scrutinised every aspect of a project and proposed it for final appraisal only when all details were in place. If not satisfied that public consultation had been completed properly, the EAC said it could ask the project promoter to do the needful. The committee also made allowance for representations with “new points” and “grave consequences” on which comments from project proponents could be sought. The EAC considered 13 projects in its December 30 meeting and cleared eight of them.

Environmental activists, however, pointed out the impracticality of the contention that representations should be restricted to the 30-day public consultation window. Sripad Dharmadhikari also, in his blog has mentions various reasons to counter the EAC’s suspicious justifications. He also says that the fact that a body which is supposed to represent the environmental perspective displays such an attitude is the biggest critique of the EAC and the environmental clearance process that it is a part of. The newly constituted MOEF’s EAC on River Valley Projects has in their very first meeting shown anti people, anti democratic and anti environment attitude.

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Dams · DRP News Bulletin

DRP News Bulletin 09 Jan. 2017 (India Continues to Witness Decline in Groundwater: Govt Report)

January 9, 2017January 9, 2017 SANDRPLeave a comment

Ground water recharge plan is a non-starter Though the latest report, covering assessment of ground level situation as on March, 2013, is still being compiled, sources in the Central Ground Water Board (CGWB) hinted at further increase in the number of `dark’ (over-exploited) units. Decline in ground water level due to over exploitation of available resources had prompted the Centre in 2013 to come out with a master plan for artificial recharge of ground water, specifying how different states would go about it on priority. But majority of the states have, so far, not implemented the master plan. Only six states -MP, Gujarat, W-Bengal, UP, Chhattisgarh and Karnataka have taken follow-up actions despite the fact that the number of `dark’ units increased from 802 in March, 2009 to 1,071 in March, 2011. This not only says what the title mentions, but also shows how slow our official agencies are in even coming up with groundwater data, the latest data is for March 2011!

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Dams · Sand Mining

River Sand Mining in India in 2016–III – Judicial Interventions

January 7, 2017January 7, 2017 SANDRP3 Comments

Ever since its land mark judgment [1] on February 27, 2012, the Supreme Court (SC) of India is not hearing any particular case pertaining to River sand mining regulation. In 2012 judgment SC had directed all Union Territories and State Governments to seek Environmental Clearances (EC) from Ministry of Environment, Forest & Climate Change (MoEF&CC) for mining minor minerals even in less than 5 ha or renew the same after prior approval from the MoEF&CC. Before this order, mining areas of less than 5 ha were exempted from EC enacted under Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA)-2006 [2].

On Aug 5, 2013, the National Green Tribunal (NGT), has passed an important decision [3] ordering a ban on sand excavation across the country without permission from State Environment Impact Assessment Authority (SEIAA) and MoEF&CC. Further in November 2013, interpreting environment as Central Government subject and directing MoEF&CC to frame uniform sand extraction rules, the NGT prohibited State Governments [4] to form mining rules separately.

Since then, in pursuit of compliance to aforesaid orders, NGT and the High Court (HC) in several States have been frequently directing respective Government agencies to facilitate sustainable River sand removal. In this context, these courts have issued a number of orders and decisions all through 2016.

In fact, the sustained hearings in SC and NGT have resulted in first to Sustainable Sand Mining Policy draft 2016 [5] and then to formation of Sustainable Sand Mining Guidelines 2016 [6].

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Dams · DRP News Bulletin

DRP News Bulletin 02 Jan 2017 (Corruption in Nepal’s Hydro Power Projects)

January 2, 2017January 2, 2017 SANDRPLeave a comment

The latest report of Transparency International reveals that lack of dependable hydrological data, authentic study, action plans giving dual meaning, lack of transparency in the power purchase agreement and a failure to increase the risk-bearing capacity among power developers have remained major hindrances towards the development of hydropower sector in Nepal.

As per the report, the irregularities start from the stages of project selection and identification and this tendency further flourished in the period of a survey and the project implementation, the report states, highlighting a responsible role from the government level to control this practice.

The report also points out that environment standard violations, inadequate compensation in regard to land acquisition, false claims, unreasonable local demands, unwarranted contract variations, bias in selection of top officials like board members and CEOs during the construction, procurement, and implementation phases are working as a catalyst to bring the hydro sector under the grip of corruption.

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Dams · DRP News Bulletin

DRP News Bulletin 26 Dec 2016 (Corruption & Fraud in 600 MW Kameng HEP in Northeast India)

December 26, 2016December 28, 2016 SANDRPLeave a comment

In addition to allegations of fraud related to inflated bills, the officials report of Satish Verma the former chief vigilance officer (CVO) of North Eastern Electric Power Corporation (NEEPCO) mentioned that there have been numerous instances of top government officials allegedly accepting hospitality and gifts that cost the PSU lakhs of rupees. These include gifts for officials in the Ministry of Power: a teak wood cabinet for the Personal Secretary to the Union Power Minister; an iPad Air 2 for the Secretary; payment of a Vodafone bill for a Special Secretary; and a mobile handset for an Additional Secretary. Continue reading “DRP News Bulletin 26 Dec 2016 (Corruption & Fraud in 600 MW Kameng HEP in Northeast India)” →

Dams

Sutlej Yamuna Link Row: Chronology of Events

November 18, 2016November 18, 2016 SANDRP1 Comment

The SYL Row has been going on inconclusively for over last about 50 years. The matter also has been languishing in SC for last 40 years without any resolution. The seemingly unending disputes have been raising questions in the mind of many as to why the issue remains undecided and for how long the controversy will go on. To have better understanding of the issue we have put together a chronology of the events around the SYL dispute.

On November 10, 2016, Honorable Supreme Court (SC) of India has pronounced its judgment on Sutlej Yamuna Link Canal (SYL). In the decision, the apex court has termed the Punjab Termination of Agreements Act 2004 invalid and ruled that Punjab is bound to share Ravi-Beas river waters with Haryana and Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan, Jammu and Kashmir and Delhi. The court has also ordered Punjab to comply with its two judgments for completion of the SYL canal.

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