Economic Highlights
New Delhi, 20 June
2022
Himalayan Fury
IMPACTS MARKETS,
TUMBLE
By Shivaji Sarkar
Gigantic Himalayan
tragedies rock and destabilise the Indian economy as development becomes fad.
The 15.9 per cent wholesale inflation, stock sensex crash by 2931points in a
week, rupee below 78, prolonged heat wave, low wheat yield, millions of tree
felling and blasts for roads are connected saga. The latest least discussed
washout of Assam’s New Haflong railway station is a testimony of the magnitude
and a tell-tale of India’s future.
Affecting of the
fragile Himalayas is stated to be the reason for most calamities and severe
heating up of the Indian subcontinent and economic woes. An Indo-US Monsoon
study linked the Himalayas to formation of cyclones up to South Africa.
About 10,000 Himalayan glaciers are receding at a rate of 30 to 60 metres (100
to 200 feet) per decade as temperatures rise with road and dam
constructions. Around 10.76 million trees were felled between 2015 and
2018 for development, as per a Rajya Sabha answer. Supreme Court for now stays
chopping of 11000 trees in Dehradun.
The nation has learnt
little from the June 2013 Kedarnath tragedy that wiped out a large chunk of the
Himalayas considered the soul of god – Devtatma killing 6000. The cost of
damages is difficult to assess but a sample can be taken from the compensation
given to flood hit people in Bihar. For Rs 5-lakh houses Rs 6000 is doled out.
Uttarakhand allocates one-third of its annual budget to disaster relief and in
2021 spent additional Rs 7000 crore.
Arunachal Pradesh’s
largest Dibang dam will chop 2.7 lakh more trees. The Haflong washout would not
have happened but for the false desire for creating a single-gauge all over.
The British time metre gauge track, created for a purpose on the fragile
patches, now being preserved for heritage purposes has its old Lower Haflong
station intact. The mudslide from nearby hills loosened by blasts engulfed the
station, marooning a number of trains, putting about 2500 people at great risk,
at least five deaths, blocks a tunnel, and links to
Tripura-Mizoram-Manipur.
It is fashionable to
discuss about Uttarakhand, but the North-East is becoming worse with
losing about 1.45 million hectares (Mha) of tree cover between
2001 and 2020, amounting to roughly 76 per cent of the country’s
total tree cover loss, according to a global study by the University of
Maryland's Global Land Analysis & Discovery (GLAD) laboratory released
by Global Forest Watch (GFW). It says India as a whole lost 1.93 Mha of tree
cover in 2001-20, including Uttarakhand’s 50,000 hectares.
Assam has the
highest share of the national tree cover loss, 14 per cent. From 2001 to 2020,
the state lost 269 kilohectare (kha) of tree cover -- 9.8 per cent decrease.
Among other Northeast states, Mizoram lost 247 kha, Nagaland 225 kha, Arunachal
Pradesh 222 kha, Manipur 196kha, Meghalaya 195 kha and Tripura lost 102 kha
tree cover in 20 years, the report said. The top five States in the list
with the maximum tree cover loss are in the North East. The seven sister States
are also among the 10 worst performers in terms of tree cover loss.
Arunachal with
proposed 169 hydropower projects is in throes of protests against construction
of mega dams over Brahmaputra and its tributaries. All Assam Students Union
that once pleaded for dam on Subansiri in 1985 now opposes it. The protests
intensified after June 2008, when excess water was released from the Ranganadi
dam, the first in Arunachal without prior warning to downstream communities.
Massive flood submerged large swathes of land, killing at least 10 people and
affecting around three lakh.
“No-more-dam” movement
is popular in Arunachal but resistance weak. So now comes the world’s largest
concrete gravity Dibang dam with 2880 MW capacity in a fragile region. It would
lead to clearing 1,165 hectares of rare traditionally protected biodiversity
forest home to the Idu Mishmi tribe. Hundreds of families in 39 villages of
Dibang Valley will be displaced. Sudden glacier meltdowns are probable at dam
site.
The pattern is almost
a repeat at Kedarnath restoration at the insistence of former Uttarakhand chief
minister Harish Rawat. Dr D.P.
Dobhal, a senior glaciologist of National Institute of Mountaineering, says
that the suggestions in their report, in accordance with higher Himalayan
geology, were ignored in the new construction.
The Ministry of
Environment and Forest (MoEF}on December, 2014 filed an affidavit driven by
“pain, anguish and outrage” demanding stoppage of work at 3292 MW seven
Uttarakhand hydropower projects, including Tapovan Vishnugad. Seven years later
in 2021 it files another saying consensus reached with the power, Jal Shakti
Ministry and the Uttarakhand government to continue work on these projects.
And in February, 2021
Tapovan saw flash flood killing 200 in Chamoli. After a study 53 scientists
from JNU, and IIT Indore, in June 2021, found that the flood was caused by
falling debris, rocks 20 metre in diameter and blocking Nanda Devi glacier
leading to 27 million cubic metres of water and debris barreling down the Ronti
Gad, Risigana and Dhauliganga river valleys rising 220 metres above the valley
flow. This trapped workers and engineers at Tapovan. The rivers are attractive for hydropower projects
but little learnt from the Vishnuprayag debacle of 2013 where for kilometres
Alkananda has vanished.
The floods, landslides
and forest fires are becoming frequent in the Himalayas as reckless road, rail
and dam constructions, tree felling, blasting and tunneling in the fragile
hills cause continuous landslides or loose rock-falls a regular affair. A Wadia
Institute of Himalayan Geology (WIHG) study has found that 51 per cent of
Uttarakhand is ‘high’ and ‘very high’ landslide-prone. The local aspirations
and large moneys often lead to undesirable ends.
The recent spate of
activities on the higher Himalayas for creating road -- railways to
Karnaprayag, and comfort zones for tourism are adding to the problems. Today,
most dams have only one-third the capacity of the power generation these were
ostensibly built for but during rains the overflows dip the people in woes. None
explains the rationale of such projects and why now being repeated in N-E.
Another side effect of
the projects is 100s of kilometers of embankment constructions following the
Tehri dam apprehending calamities. If the cost of these is added to the Tehri,
it would be stupendous and exposes the human folly.
Policy paradigm has to
recognise, National Disaster Management Authority warns, check on construction
for protecting the Himalayas. It is key to boosting the sagging Indian economy
be it the stocks, commodities or manufacturing. --- INFA
(Copyright, India News
& Feature Alliance)
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