Will the people stand for this....?

Politics makes strange bedfellows, or so the adage goes. And perhaps no nation’s systems so very exemplify this maxim as India’s. Political outfits which swear by the inimical nature of their interactions at one moment, become the best of buddies in the very next. Sometimes, this change of heart is prompted by ‘national’ interest, sometime by ‘self’ interest, and sometimes because coming together will benefit everyone in the system. It is very rare for the political class to come together for something that will really go to work for the ‘people’, and therefore when they come together, it only bodes ill.

Just a day after the ‘executive’ President of the Shiv Sena, Uddhav Thackeray made a pronouncement that the Congress was the Sena’s enemy number one, the Sena, in a majority in the local Municipal Corporation, managed to get the Congress to join hands and pass through a resolution modifying the status of a huge plot of land from no-development to residential. The plot of land falls under the strict CRZ norms and hence development till now had been hampered by the environmental norms prevalent under the CRZ regime.

Politics and environmental concerns rarely go hand-in-hand, at least not in India. One reason for this could be that there isn’t much awareness about to what extent the environment affects us. And in a place wherein such an issue gets such low importance, it tends to be bartered away for trivial benefits. The benefits per se may not seem trivial, but in the context of what one is giving away, certainly comes out to be very trivial.

The BMC (Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation) has decided to de-reserve the aforesaid plot and re-designate it as a residential plot, in lieu of which the developer will construct, as ‘compensation’, primary and secondary schools, playground, a maternity home, a library, and a market. These all may seem good, but are we being bribed here? Are the people being told, “Sure, I am destroying the environment, but am I not building these facilities for you at the same time?”

Mangroves are the natural drains for Mumbai. After the cataclysmic deluge of 27 June 2005, their importance is perhaps even more emphasized, and yet it would seem that neither the State nor private enterprise is neither keen to appreciate this, nor are they ready to do something to ensure that environmental concerns are given a fair hearing before they are haggled away to satisfy developmental requirements. This deal is perhaps yet another breach of trust committed by those who claim to enjoy the mandate of the people, who claim to represent the will of the people. Given a choice between slower development and better safety during such adverse climatic conditions, I am certain that the people of Mumbai would be more in favour of better safety. Any initiative hindering or hampering such a need is clearly against the ‘will’ of the people.

That there were voices of protest against this move is still a good thing, a sign that there are still some representatives who feel for their constituents, for the ‘tired and toiling masses’. It Is only my hope and prayer that this minority become a more vocal and most powerful majority, so as to ensure that at least at the local level, our democracy can truly become ‘by the people, of the people, and for the people’.

Green thumbs,,,

A favourite diatribe of everyone against the news media is that the newspapers and news channels rarely if ever focus on positive events, on happenings which possibly bear the potential of making us feel glad and happy. I am not counting celebrity marriages in my definition of positive events, because more often than not these events tend to divert us hopelessly from the real issues. I mean, devoting uninterrupted airtime to covering a marriage is so very stupid, it just makes me wonder whether the news media has completely lost it.

But then I guess all is not lost yet. Once in a while, one solitary news item emerges from the gaggle of inanities which simply makes my heart happy. And that is what makes reading the newspaper and watching news channels all the more worthwhile at times, if just to catch every one of these rare occurrences.

Reports have it that a team of Delhi University environment management students, in collaboration with Steel Authority of India Ltd. (SAIL), has managed to convert an area of over 2,500 acres of land, previously covered by mining waste, into a lush-green garden with bamboo plantations and orchards, and all this in a span of 1.5 years. Admittedly, the time span may seem large, but considering the magnitude of the task concerned, it is simply OUTSTANDING. I mean, it takes us barely 2-3 months to destroy the face of a beautiful mountain or hill, and here in a span of less than 2 years, this team has shown it possible to rejuvenate land that we would have otherwise forsaken as barren.

The Nandigram and the Silchar agitations have primarily arisen because industrial development was proposed on land which was fertile. People state that if fertile land is not used for agriculture, then which land is to be used. I think the solution would be to evaluate the feasibility of extending this project to all similar areas in other part of the country, which are affected by mining, quarrying etc activities. Rejuvenating barren land would effectively reduce the pressure and essentially make people more amenable to projects, as there would be always a viable alternative available. Happy days could be here again...

Reference: DU students transform mining land into green belt.

Poem of The Day - In the Old Days a poet once said - Ko Un

In the old days a poet once said
our nation is destroyed
yet the mountains and rivers survive.

Today's poet says
the mountains and rivers are destroyed
yet our nation survives.

Tomorrow's poet will say
the mountains and rivers are destroyed
our nation is destroyed and Alas!
you and I are completely destroyed.

- Ko Un

Wild and endangered....

The environs in which we live are perhaps the most endangered ones. I am not jesting when I say this, what with the paucity of open spaces in our cities, forest land being appropriated in a most indiscriminate manner for ‘development’, and basic environmental norms and regulations flouted with impunity. Poachers and illicit loggers are free to roam to do their business destroying the natural heritage, while those charged with protecting it are constrained by the lack of adequate manpower, resources and an overall interfering political class.

Our environmental laws are a joke at best. Antiquated, redundant, and completely ineffective in today’s circumstances, these norms only serve to restrict our efficacy in regulating and protecting our flora and fauna from harm. Reluctance to invest in mechanisms which would modernise and consequently make the forest service more effective is perhaps the most glaring example of this myopia.

Tiger conservation, once the pride of India’s preservation movement, has now become its biggest failure. All over the place, tigers are dropping dead like flies, and I suspect we all know why. Disease may be a factor, but that doesn’t explain why only tigers are getting afflicted by it. The biggest factor that affects the wildlife is poaching. Poaching is inherently a disgusting and abominable profession. To seek wealth from the murder of such beautiful creatures, to seek happiness on earth by shedding the innocent blood of so many of these divine beings, is to forsake happiness beyond life, to be tormented in the deepest and most horrible depths of Hades, wherever it may be.

All around, forests are being cleared without care or concern to accommodate for malls, residential complexes, industrial belts, and what not. Agriculturists have been clearing forestland to increase their acreage. And all this while, our Government, “defender of justice”, has sat silent.

Ashish makes a very pertinent point when he says that we are bypassing a major opportunity to use the innate skills of the aboriginal tribes to conserve the forests and the fauna contained in them. By asking these tribes to vacate the forests, we are evicting them from an environs which they are familiar with, and in the process, destroying a system which could be used to stem the problem of poaching and illegal logging.

This cannot go on. Sariska cannot be allowed to happen again. Ranthambhore, Kaziranga, Gir, Melghat, Periyar, and other preserves call out to our attention. Should we fail to respond now, it may be too late later on. The clock is ticking.

The promise of the future or the future of the promise...?

Over time, and perhaps having seen so much criticism over the developed world's lackadaisical approach towards environmental issues in general, best illustrated by the US' reluctance to endorse the Kyoto Protocol, it has come to be felt that while the developed world is happy to dispense advice on how to avoid using non-renewable resources, and in particular in the area of energy resources, it is content to just advise people and do very little on similar lines. Gas guzzlers and the lack of serious and practical caps on greenhouse gas emissions make any stand taken by developed countries on environmental issues a tad hypocritical, and reduce the level of importance that the world in general attaches to the matter.

And so, it is largely satisfying to see the emphasis that the Olympic Delivery Authority for London 2012 is placing on low carbon emissions, waste, and on the propagation of green transportation avenues. The Olympics is perhaps the best medium that any advertiser can seek, and considering that in today's health conscious world, sports play such an important role, any message that the Olympics will be seen to be giving out will stand a greater chance of being well-received.
While one finds plenty of governmental norms and regulations mandating environmental safeguards, and many even successfully being implemented, it is still a matter of concern that environmentalism is being seen as anti-development, and consequently as anti-progress. While I don't support development for the sake of development, it is imperative that we comprehend that the environment is not a static entity; rather, it is a dynamic being that changes its needs and requirements with time. While mowing down forests and bulldozing valleys is not my idea of progress, it is also the need of the hour that forests and valleys not be seen as impediments to the benefits that the locals can derive from development.

We need to educate and enlighten people that while development is all fine and good, the environment also needs to be conserved, primarily because development that may be justifiable today may not be so in the future. We need to study the track-records of those countries who have successfully managed to find the Middle Way between irrational developmental attitudes and zealous environmentalism, in order to comprehend how we may go about the task of preserving our environment, of making sure that our children, and their generations to follow, will be able to enjoy a quality life, and perhaps will thank us for our efforts in doing so.

The environment is not the holding or the possession of any particular generation; rather it is simply to be safeguarded by each generation for the next, to be preserved and nourished as a mother nourishes her child. Should we give our future a world denuded of its beauties and simply filled with concrete structures and tar roads, I fear we would be in breach of trust, and perhaps never again will a child trust his parent to be his well-wisher, his guardian.

The rains have come!

Change is good, especially when it's with respect to the weather. The weather for the last few days has been extremely unbearable, and the absence of the rains didn't make things any better. But, now there are no complaints. The life-giving waters have arrived, and the world, at least Mumbai, has plenty reasons to rejoice.

As I write this, I can see beautiful scenes of an exultant Nature. Magpie robins, bulbuls, and birds of myraid colours, all frolicking in tiny pools of water, are shrieking in delight. Everything appears so clean, so fresh, that one cannot resist going out and getting wet. This is the season when the cobs of roasted corn by Chowpatty tastes the best. When coffee and tea in the balcony seems like the ambrosia of heaven. When the sea seems like a beautiful maiden, dancing in her best attire. When the skies tell the sun and the moon, "Shine less brightly for a few days, for you deserve the rest."

This is when we can reasonably expect to get some rain holidays. Maybe that's why we term the monsoon, as the mon"soon", as if telling it, "Mon, come soon". Because, everything that it brings alongwith it is so very enjoyable, so very delightful.