Jairam's note: PM seeks clarification

Prime Minister's Office has sought clarification from the coal and power ministries on environment minister Jairam Ramesh's note blaming the two ministries for degrading Indian forests.

Updated on: Jun 26, 2011, 22:59:22 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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Prime Minister's Office has sought clarification from the coal and power ministries on environment minister Jairam Ramesh's note blaming the two ministries for degrading Indian forests.

Ramesh's note to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh comes in wake of coal and power ministries blaming him for failing to meet their production targets and is part of the ongoing slinging match going on between the UPA ministers.

Coal production in first four years of the 11th plan had been around 6.2 % as against the target of 9.5 % whereas the power generation had been only 63 % of the target for the plan period.

Instead of taking the blame, Ramesh told the Prime Minister that the two ministries have failed to deliver and also caused ecological loss.

He even spoke to Railway Board chairman Vivek Sahai to counter coal ministry's claim that railways was not providing enough rakes to lift coal from pitheads. As a result, unlifted coal at pitheads was 70 million tones in 2010-11. Sahai told him that railways had to lift 40 % of the coal production which it was doing without fail.

Ramesh also raised the issue of two lakh hectares of forestland lying, which Coal India had failed to return to the state government despite closure of the coal mines. He also questioned the company's claim on compensatory afforestation saying it was not up to the mark.

Hitting at the power ministry, Ramesh, in his two page note, said huge amount of flyash -- half of the total coal burnt -- being generated by the thermal power plants was causing environmental problems.

Around 40 % of the total land for a thermal power plant is required to store flyash in special ponds and it was an issue of concern, Ramesh wrote.

The PMO before the next Group of Ministers meeting on environmental issues on July 14 has sought replies of coal and power ministry and has asked planning commission member B K Chaturvedi to submit a note on the same.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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