Dehradun: With Uttarakhand going to the polls on February 15 the biggest issue not being addressed by any party is the state of the environment.
Strange, considering that in the past decade it has been ecological issues, ranging from flash floods to cloud bursts and forest fires to degradation of the hills, that has impacted the people in this sylvan state the most.
Uttarakhand’s environment has been stretched to breaking point by tourism, dam building and sand mining along river banks.
Environmental calamities, of which the 2013 floods is the most extreme example, have destroyed life and property. This is the elephant in the room that scarcely finds mention in party manifestoes or candidates meetings.
The Congress and BJP manifestoes talk of development, irrigation and distributing of freebies like laptops and smart phones. Talk also centers on stopping migration from the state, creating job opportunities and providing quality education.
The Bhagirathi and the Alaknanda, the two headstreams of the Ganga, have been dammed repeatedly. Tunnels have been blasted in the mountains to divert the water and where the river bed stands exposed, sand mining has ravaged the river banks.
All the rivers that originate in the glacial heights of the Uttarakhand Himalayas have been tapped for their hydro-electric potential, as a nation hungry for economic growth taps every possible source that yields energy. The result is a flood of development along rivers, devastated mountains and an ecological balance increasingly under threat. Add to this the strain that tourism places – both of the religious and adventure variety – and what you have is a recipe for environmental disaster.
No party wants to seriously address the threats to the environment since sand mining and power generation brings in most of the money to the state coffers, and into the pockets of politicians. And since tourism is one of the few revenue earners in the hill state no one wants to regulate it.
Matri Sadan is a tranquil ashram in Haridwar. Located on 2.5 acres of land beside the Ganga, peacocks frolick across the grass and birds chirp overhead in the trees. Sadhus, who have renounced the worldly life mill around the founder, Swami Sivananda.
But don’t let the tranquility fool you. Matri Sadan has been at the forefront of the fight against the “environmental destruction” of the Ganga. Three policemen with sten guns provide round-the-clock security. The ashram has campaigned against the sand mining mafia and got many illegal units closed. The ashram remains a target for the mafia.
“The Ganga has been totally destroyed by greed. Diversion of its waters, illegal sand mining and damming the river has taken its toll,” Swami Sivananda told News18 when this correspondent visited the ashram.
“If you want to kill a person block his veins. If you want to destroy a culture, destroy its rivers,” he added.
Swami Sivanand reeled off numbers to substantiate his claim of how the river was being damaged. Water is diverted from the main river downstream for irrigation, while upstream, the water is diverted to power the hydro electric dams. Every town and city in Uttarakhand releases its sewage into the river, while downstream, in Uttar Pradesh, every industrial cluster and unit releases toxins.
Industrial pollutants constitute 25% of the waste released into the Ganga, according to Shashi Shekhar, former Water secretary, but their toxicity is high since they do not break down. Sewage, on the other hand is oxidized by the water as it flows downstream, allowing the river potential to regenerate itself.
The sewage treatment plants along the river are not adequate for the job. “About 95% of the treated water did not meet the standards set by the pollution control board,” Shashi Shekhar told News 18.
The fate of the Ganga is just one example of a larger blight. Rivers, streams, hills and forests in the sylvan hill state have been tapped for development and profit, ignoring the sensitive ecological balance that binds humans and nature together.
Further pressure is put by the enormous demands that tourism places. And with climate change making the weather more extreme and unpredictable the recipe for disaster looms large.
“There have been cloud bursts in the hills every year for the last 6 or 7 years,” Shashi Shekhar said. And yet no party wants to seriously engage with the effects of breakneck development on the environment.
An area of 4,000 square km from Gangotri to Uttarkashi was notified as an eco-sensitive zone by the Union Environment Ministry, which would have imposed restrictions on dam building, mining and tree cutting. However, the Uttarakhand Assembly passed a unanimous resolution against the notification.
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