The government on Monday said it would resist any move to remove R.K. Pachauri as head of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change even as it accused the UN body of failing to apply established standards in case of Himalayan glaciers.
The IPCC in its fourth assessment report had
said that most Himalayan glaciers would vanish by 2035, but regretted error in January this year as it was found that the claim was based on a NGO report.
“Our objection was to the panic and alarm that the IPCC tried to spread,” Environment and Forest Minister Jairam Ramesh told the Rajya Sabha. “In drafting the paragraph on the subject in question, the clear and well established standards of evidence, required by the IPCC procedures, were not applied properly."
In the same vein, he admitted that most of the 9,000 to 13,000 glaciers on the Indian sides were retreating but some like Siachen glacier was advancing marginally.
The western countries, he felt, used the IPCC report to pressurise India to come on board to accept mitigation targets, which was successfully rejected.
But, one IPCC error won’t mean India would allow Pachuri’s removal, he said. “Our problem with the (IPCC) procedures does not mean we are not backing the Indian chairman of IPCC,” Ramesh said.
The government’s backing has helped Pachauri. "Certainly not," Pachauri said when asked if he too would resign.