Thursday March 28, 2024
SNc Channels:

Search
About Salem-News.com

 

Jun-21-2013 11:43printcomments

The Himalayan Disaster is Man Made

These projects and related construction have destabilised the mountains. The entire Himalayan region is highly unstable. The Indian plate is ploughing into the Eurasian land mass at a rate of 42 millimetre per year.

Himalayan tragedy
channelnewsasia

(NEW DELHI) - Heavy rains in the past 48 hours have turned the Himalayan state of Uttarakhand into a disaster area. From Pithoragarh to Kumaon-Garhwal region and the religious centres in the upper reaches are all severely affected. The latest report indicates over 100,000 pilgrims are trapped. Roads and bridges have been washed away or so badly damaged that normal vehicular traffic can’t pass.

Uttarakhand is ‘Dev Bhumi,’ God’s Country. It is a holy land for us. Starting April, devout Hindus from all over the world come to Haridwar and on to Rishikesh. From Rishikesh they travel to Badrinath, Kedarnath, Gangotri [the place of origin of the Ganges] and Yamunotri [place of origin of River Yamuna]. Ancient shrines are located in these places.

Nearly all major shrines are now inaccessible. Local administration reported 131 deaths which is gross underestimation because even local people don’t know how many homes have been washed away. Yesterday, a friend sent a photograph of the destruction of Kedarnath town which is under seven feet of mud; helicopters can’t land. By 4 PM today, seventeen bodies had been recovered; no one knows how many are buried. Although the minister for Disaster Management says that after receiving the warning from Met Department he had stopped the travel, Hill Post says, “If the Kedarnath yatra was stopped at Ram Bara and Gauri Kund, then there should have been about 10,000 pilgrims either on their way up on their way down from the shrine”……………officials now confirm that Ram Bara has been completely washed away and there is nothing but silt and debris there. Gauri Kund and Kedarnath are completely devastated.

A Tribune Newspaper report, filed 18th June, says “According to the Disaster Mitigation and Management Centre (DMMC, Uttarakhand), there are still 61,890 pilgrims stranded at various places in the state: Rudraprayag (25,000), Chamoli (27,040) and Uttarkashi (9,850).” This is not true; the Government is lying. At least 250,000 cars pass through Shrinagar university town every month during the time the shrines are open. Similar heavy traffic goes via Tehri to Kedarnath and Badrinath.

Villages in Pithoragarh district bordering Nepal have suffered extensive damage, loss of lives and property. Downstream of Kali Nadi, river that forms the natural boundary between Nepal and India, people have observed TV sets and household items floating, indicating that there has been extensive destruction in the upper reaches of Pithoragarh. Unfortunately, no one is talking about them, not one channel, not one newspaper. Only local newspapers have reported the ground situation.

Villages Nagni and Khari, where five decades ago the famous ‘Chipko Andolan’ [Tree Huggers’ movement] was started by environmentalist Mr. Sunderlal Bahuguna to protect Himalayan forests and biodiversity, can’t be accessed now because the road has disappeared at three places.

Over 5,000 men from the armed forces, ten aircrafts of the Indian Air Force [IAF], men and women from Vishwa Hindu Parishad [VHP], the students’ wing of Hindu groups are helping the stranded people irrespective of which religion they belong to. Helicopters could not land in disaster areas due to adverse conditions and only since yesterday, when the rains stopped, sorties are on.

livemint.com

Why did this happen?


Five years ago we conducted a detailed survey based research at three river basins –Satluj, Beas and Ravi-all primed for large and medium hydro-electric projects; small micro-hydels are coming up on the tributaries and small rivers that feed the big rivers. We saw that water from one basin is being transferred to another, roads and bridges never meant for heavy vehicular traffic were being used for carrying 40-60 metric tonnes load, tunnelling was being done using dynamite, muck from blasting was being dumped into pristine rivers, and more blasting was going on to produce coarse aggregate. We had warned that if the situation is allowed to go on, rivers will flow in tunnels and forests will be gone. We estimated that each megawatt capacity requires on average four hectare of forest and private lands for these projects. Slated for 250,000 MWe of hydro-power projects, the entire Himalayan region, from Pakistan to Arunachal Pradesh, could lose over a million hectares and that is a conservative estimate. One needs a lot more land for transmission lines and support services.

The Comptroller and Auditor General [CAG] had warned three years ago that a major disaster is bound to happen in the two main tributaries of the Ganges-Alaknanda and Bhagirathi. CAG’s environmental audit of hydro-power development had alerted the Central and the State Government that the hundreds of dams that are operational or under construction were causing severe damage to the hills and rivers and that the scale of damage to the fragile ecosystem will cause unimaginable disaster. We have it now.

These projects and related construction have destabilised the mountains. The entire Himalayan region is highly unstable. The Indian plate is ploughing into the Eurasian land mass at a rate of 42 millimetre per year. In the past 100 years at least one earthquake has hit the region every four years and one major quake every twenty. Yet, the predatory capitalism has been let loose; jokers with experience of running grocery stores are setting up power plants. The Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister was collecting Rs 700,000 thousand cash for each Megawatt of hydro-power plant approved by his Government; other freebies not counted. In this ruthless plundering of natural resources, the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank and world’s leading hydro-power consultants are totally complicit. These scoundrels visit project sites for a day or two and write a feasibility report sitting in Tasmania or London or Paris.

As on 18th June, all big hydro-power generators, except Kalagarh, have stopped generation because of silt. This is not an unknown or unforeseen problem. Not one project authority has done detailed Environment Management Plan [EMP] or Disaster Management Plan [DMP]. None has prepared Environment Impact Assessment [EIA] seriously when EIA is the basis for investment decision; majority of EIAs are cut and paste job. Government’s regulators and advisors are complicit in this Himalayan fraud. And this bloody minded Prime Minister Manmohan Singh wants to further dilute the environmental regulatory rules and laws.

Accounts from local activists

Courtesy: newdelhisamachar.wordpress.com

Pithoragarh: Renu informed me that first reports from people suggest that Jauljibi village is completely devastated; perhaps not one home stands there. The village is about 25 kilometres from Ascote village where Renu lives which is close to Block headquarter at Dharshula. If Jauljibi is gone one can only guess how many villages are gone. Pithoragarh is the eastern-most district and shares border with Nepal. About two weeks ago, cloudburst had caused glacier collapse destroying two bridges and many villages and then the rains started.

Neither the administration nor the national media bothered. It is only when pilgrims from all over India started calling up their friends and relations about the disaster that the media woke up and the administration even started talking.

We are told that there was no preparedness on part of the administration. Disaster Management Fund remained largely unutilised. This is the story that is repeated on and on in continental sized India: climate change devastates one or other region, yet the administration and the disastrous Disaster Management Team warms its asses on cushioned chair.

And I say this: If one European tourist gets stranded, it becomes international news; when tens of villages are washed away with hundreds of families, no one talks. If one European life is more precious than the families of ten villages up in the mountains, we don’t need this sort of media or these tourists and both have become a liability for us. They can stay in their country and spare us some costs and the media presstitutes can go fuck themselves.

Chief Minister kicked out

Vijay Bahuguna, the Chief Minister of Uttarakhand, is not only a rascal; he is mentally challenged, like the crown prince Rahul Gandhi. “What can I do when the roads are gone?” When he landed on his Government helicopter at Gulab Rai helipad and other ‘helipads’ of these non-performing assets and heavy weight liabilities, the people told him to ‘fuck off.’ ‘People are angry is an understatement,’ says Biju Negi, an environmental activist from Dehradun.

The grave situation was known on 16th June, right across Uttarakhand. Indian Army’s response time is 45 minutes from the time a disaster is declared to reaching the spot to commence rescue and communication restoration. In these parts soldiers trained in mountain warfare are placed. But the army can’t move unless the Army Chief orders it. General Bikram Singh, a dishonourable soldier, is a US choice imposed on India. He did not order his army to move for two days when the Kokrajhar events happened last year. Why did he not order his army to stay on full alert and move? Was he waiting for district administration’s request? Doesn’t India know that the district civilian administration has effectively ceased to exist?

Shameless politicians and bureaucrats

Chief Ministers from different states in India, from West Bengal, Punjab, Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh, from where pilgrims are trapped are talking about rescuing their citizens! In Hemkunt sahib, a Sikh shrine, reports indicate minimum casualty. Their ministers and secretaries have landed in Dehradun, Uttarakhand’s capital, to ensure safety of their state’s people. Can there be more overt divisive strategy between the people of India? Who is doing that? What about the people of Uttarakhand who host these tourists? Has anyone shown any respect and courtesy to the host population? Has India’s secularist brigade raised voice to find out where have the tens of thousands of villagers disappeared? Is it because we are Hindus? One senior journalist told me that officers are least bothered about doing their job. This is generally true across India: they are no more interested in work except writing memos to defend their inaction.

Presstitutes [Press+Prostitutes]

For the first 24 hours, this was no news. On day-2, some channels started showing old footage of earlier disaster. According to one local media expert the footage of 3-4 storey building breaking apart and being engulfed in flood water was an old footage. The national media took notice when they got wind of the fact that many chief ministers have taken the matter very seriously. And even today, the major disaster that has befallen upon the people of Pithoragarh district has not been front-paged or shown on leading TV channels.

History submerged

In 1900, during the British period, at the height of alien colonial rule, over 50,000 Hindu pilgrims went to Kedarnath and Badrinath and further up. Many of the pilgrims were old men seeking penance. Many never returned. Some were attacked by wild animals; some died of exhaustion. There is an ancient stone road, by the river Alaknanda, that goes from Shrinagar town right up to Rudraprayag, and many caves where pilgrims used to halt for the night. Between Shrinagar town and Rudraprayag, these ancient pathways are under water from Alaknanda Hydro-electric project.

Too little, too late

                                                                       Pictures from Rudraprayag

The story is over; people are dead, dying, many going hungry for the fifth day. The entire focus is on the tourists, not the villagers. And certainly not on serious planning to avoid similar disasters. Manmohan Singh’s Rs 10,000 million sop to Vijay Bahuguna’s fund will line the pockets of ministers, bureaucrats and lower level thieves and the contractors. Nothing will happen to mitigate the pain and suffering of Uttarakhand’s hill communities. What will money do when farmers have lost their entire rice crop and because of that loss, they will have no seeds for the next year’s sowing? Private seed companies are already active in these parts. ‘Every disaster is a business opportunity for them,’ says Biju Negi.

For centuries, Hindu pilgrims have been travelling to these parts. The Government could have provided good roads and bridges and places to stay. Even proper planning rules merely exist on paper: about 50% of the hotels, Dharamshalas and private residences have been constructed in violation of building code and planning rules. There is no shortage of technically competent engineers in India but are they allowed to work? The indifference that the Central and State Governments have shown in managing and preventing disaster exposes the incompetence and sheer callousness of officers.


Arun Shrivastava is Salem-News.com's South Asia Correspondent. An accredited management consultant, Arun is also a highly experienced researcher and writer. He studied in India and England and returned to India in 1989, after a brief stint as senior officer with Economic Development Unit of Birmingham (UK). From 1989 to 1994, he taught Strategic Management and Long Range Planning to MBA students at International Management Institute in Delhi.

About twenty years ago he founded two institutions, one for consulting and another for doing sponsored research work; today both are known for excellence. Since the events of 9/11, he has devoted much of his time to researching NWO issues. Arun also moderates International Human Rights Organizations’ discussion group.

Salem-News.com is very pleased that Arun Shrivastava chose to join our dynamic team which has been paying increasing attention to problems taking place in India. He is Salem-News.com's 94th writer and his presence allows us to better cover important events in an increasingly interconnected world community.

You can send an email to Arun Shrivastava at this address: arunshrivastava.1951@gmail.com




Comments Leave a comment on this story.
Name:

All comments and messages are approved by people and self promotional links or unacceptable comments are denied.



the traveller June 22, 2013 1:13 am (Pacific time)

Trash Talk.. at its best

What could you possible mean?  I think your name might properly be 'business representative"

[Return to Top]
©2024 Salem-News.com. All opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Salem-News.com.


Articles for June 20, 2013 | Articles for June 21, 2013 | Articles for June 22, 2013
The NAACP of the Willamette Valley

Support
Salem-News.com:

Click here for all of William's articles and letters.

Special Section: Truth telling news about marijuana related issues and events.


googlec507860f6901db00.html