The Uttarakhand Disaster: A wake-up call
The Uttarakhand disaster at the beginning of the 2013 monsoon season is a consequence of ignorance and greed. Uttarakhand is the source of Ganga and its tributaries. The disaster which has led to five thousand deaths on current estimates and the disappearance of nearly 100000 people is a wake-up call.
We need to be informed by the latest of ecological sciences, not by an obsolete “development” model which is nothing more than an exploitation model which has led to the tragic disaster in Uttarakhand. The disaster is clearly manmade, not a natural disaster, and politicians, decision makers, businesses need to take responsibility for the disaster their actions and policies have caused.
Today, driven by greed and corruption, the government has become ignorant of the culture of the sacred, and the ecological fragility of the Himalaya. The sacred sets limits. Ecological fragility sets limits. Today these limits are being violated, as rivers are dammed and diverted for electricity, and the pilgrimage to the Char Dhams is being turned into crass consumerist mass tourism.
Mass tourism has led to construction on the fragile banks of the rivers. When rivers flood, more damage is caused.
In my childhood old people did the pilgrimage on foot. Along the main arteries we had roads for one way traffic. Today, there is an attempt to make 4 lane highways in the mountains. Highways means landslides as mountain slopes are dynamited, and the rubble is thrown down the slope. Landslides create slope instability, with more boulders and debris causing destruction of forests and fields. Less space is left for water, rivers flood more easily. And instead of reaching faster, pilgrims and local people face road blocks for days on end due to landslides. Pilgrim tourism needs to be “slow” tourism to respect the sacredness and fragility of the Himalaya.
Blasting with dynamite recklessly for the construction of dams and tunnels has triggered thousands of landslides. When the first rain comes, these landslides fill the river bed with rubble. There is no space for the water to flow. We are literally stealing the ecological space from our rivers. And when they have no space to flow, they will overflow, cut banks and cause flooding.
Usually floods come at the end of a heavy monsoon. This year they came with the first rain. The monsoon came early, and the rainfall was much more than normal. This is climate instability. Meantime, the ecological damage caused by maldevelopment has reduced the capacity of the mountain ecosystem to deal with heavy rain. Climate havoc adds to the vulnerability.
Kedarnath, the 8th century Shiva shrine is located at the source of the Mandakini river. The damage at Kedarnath was caused by the fragmentation and falling of a glacier and the bursting of a glacial lake. These are climate disasters. Yet just before the Copenhagen Climate Conference, in order to join the US in denying climate change, the Government issued a report saying there was no impact on our glaciers.
The Kedarnath tragedy shows haw heavy the cost of this denial is. We need to recognize that our glaciers are threatened, and melting glaciers will lead to disasters. Disaster preparedness is the duty of government. But disaster preparedness needs honest and robust ecological science, and honest and robust participatory democracy.
The Chief Minister has said the damage will cost Rs 3000 Crore (Rs 30 billion), and it has undone 3 years of “development”. He obviously is only looking at profits from concrete and construction. He cannot see the soil that has been washed away and the 500 years it will take to build one inch of the protective layer of top soil, the skin of the mountains. He cannot see the thousands of years it took for rivers to shape the landscape and the communities to create their settlements in river valleys. He cannot see the millions of years it took the Himalaya to form.
He cannot see the sustainable economies and cultures built by local communities over thousands of years of hard work to coexist with the fragile mountains, their home. He cannot see that the destruction of their lives and livelihoods cannot be reversed in 3 years. In many cases the damage is irreversible and immeasurable. Local communities, who have been made invisible in the media and government reports of the disaster will never get back the lives of their loved ones that were extinguished, or the fields and homes that were washed away.
But those that have caused the damage -the construction companies like JP, GVK, LANCO, L&T - who are building dams by recklessly blasting the ecologically sensitive Himalaya will be bailed out through our tax money, without our consent and approval.
Dr. Shiva is is an Indian environmental activist and anti-globalization author based in Delhi
The Uttarakhand disaster at the beginning of the 2013 monsoon season is a consequence of ignorance and greed. Uttarakhand is the source of Ganga and its tributaries. The disaster which has led to five thousand deaths on current estimates and the disappearance of nearly 100000 people is a wake-up...
The Uttarakhand disaster at the beginning of the 2013 monsoon season is a consequence of ignorance and greed. Uttarakhand is the source of Ganga and its tributaries. The disaster which has led to five thousand deaths on current estimates and the disappearance of nearly 100000 people is a wake-up call.
We need to be informed by the latest of ecological sciences, not by an obsolete “development” model which is nothing more than an exploitation model which has led to the tragic disaster in Uttarakhand. The disaster is clearly manmade, not a natural disaster, and politicians, decision makers, businesses need to take responsibility for the disaster their actions and policies have caused.
Today, driven by greed and corruption, the government has become ignorant of the culture of the sacred, and the ecological fragility of the Himalaya. The sacred sets limits. Ecological fragility sets limits. Today these limits are being violated, as rivers are dammed and diverted for electricity, and the pilgrimage to the Char Dhams is being turned into crass consumerist mass tourism.
Mass tourism has led to construction on the fragile banks of the rivers. When rivers flood, more damage is caused.
In my childhood old people did the pilgrimage on foot. Along the main arteries we had roads for one way traffic. Today, there is an attempt to make 4 lane highways in the mountains. Highways means landslides as mountain slopes are dynamited, and the rubble is thrown down the slope. Landslides create slope instability, with more boulders and debris causing destruction of forests and fields. Less space is left for water, rivers flood more easily. And instead of reaching faster, pilgrims and local people face road blocks for days on end due to landslides. Pilgrim tourism needs to be “slow” tourism to respect the sacredness and fragility of the Himalaya.
Blasting with dynamite recklessly for the construction of dams and tunnels has triggered thousands of landslides. When the first rain comes, these landslides fill the river bed with rubble. There is no space for the water to flow. We are literally stealing the ecological space from our rivers. And when they have no space to flow, they will overflow, cut banks and cause flooding.
Usually floods come at the end of a heavy monsoon. This year they came with the first rain. The monsoon came early, and the rainfall was much more than normal. This is climate instability. Meantime, the ecological damage caused by maldevelopment has reduced the capacity of the mountain ecosystem to deal with heavy rain. Climate havoc adds to the vulnerability.
Kedarnath, the 8th century Shiva shrine is located at the source of the Mandakini river. The damage at Kedarnath was caused by the fragmentation and falling of a glacier and the bursting of a glacial lake. These are climate disasters. Yet just before the Copenhagen Climate Conference, in order to join the US in denying climate change, the Government issued a report saying there was no impact on our glaciers.
The Kedarnath tragedy shows haw heavy the cost of this denial is. We need to recognize that our glaciers are threatened, and melting glaciers will lead to disasters. Disaster preparedness is the duty of government. But disaster preparedness needs honest and robust ecological science, and honest and robust participatory democracy.
The Chief Minister has said the damage will cost Rs 3000 Crore (Rs 30 billion), and it has undone 3 years of “development”. He obviously is only looking at profits from concrete and construction. He cannot see the soil that has been washed away and the 500 years it will take to build one inch of the protective layer of top soil, the skin of the mountains. He cannot see the thousands of years it took for rivers to shape the landscape and the communities to create their settlements in river valleys. He cannot see the millions of years it took the Himalaya to form.
He cannot see the sustainable economies and cultures built by local communities over thousands of years of hard work to coexist with the fragile mountains, their home. He cannot see that the destruction of their lives and livelihoods cannot be reversed in 3 years. In many cases the damage is irreversible and immeasurable. Local communities, who have been made invisible in the media and government reports of the disaster will never get back the lives of their loved ones that were extinguished, or the fields and homes that were washed away.
But those that have caused the damage -the construction companies like JP, GVK, LANCO, L&T - who are building dams by recklessly blasting the ecologically sensitive Himalaya will be bailed out through our tax money, without our consent and approval.
Dr. Shiva is is an Indian environmental activist and anti-globalization author based in Delhi
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