Politics of hydro projects hit Uttarakhand

Politics over hydro projects on tributaries of river Ganga is heating up with former Indian Institute of Technology professor G D Aggarwal sitting on a fast-unto-death demanding scrapping of eight projects on these rivers.

Updated on: Jan 20, 2012, 21:39:47 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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Politics over hydro projects on tributaries of river Ganga is heating up with former Indian Institute of Technology professor G D Aggarwal sitting on a fast-unto-death demanding scrapping of eight projects on these rivers.

Environment ministry has already decided that no new projects would be approved on tributaries --- Mandakani, Alakananda, Bhagirathi and Aasi Ganga --- but the activists having support of various Hindu groups have demanded scrapping all on-going projects.

Hydro-projects on river Ganga had been a sensitive political issue in the Himalayan state going to polls on January 30. Both Congress and BJP have opposed hydro projects in the upper Ganga basin but refused to scrap all on going projects citing huge investments already been made.

The Central government had scrapped two projects of National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) in Uttarakhand under pressure from Aggarwal. But, the environment ministry's approval to Chamoli hydro project despite concerns raised by a statutory advisory body has triggered the latest round of protests.

Environment minister Jayanthi Natarajan has now held back the approval given to the project but the activists believe election is the right time to seek commitment from Congress and BJP on scrapping of the ongoing projects.

"We have no option other than to protest. We may not have crowd to influence the government but has strong faith to have an impact," Aggarwal said in a letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. Aggarwal had earlier sat on fast leading to Singh declaring Ganga as a national river and setting up an authority to protect it.

Aggarwal and his supports believe the authority has failed to implement its mandate and was trying to promote hydro-projects which could destroy ecology of the Himalayan belt. He has been fasting for the last five days in Allahabad in Uttar Pradesh and will shift to Haridwar (Uttarakhand) in last week of January. Aggarwal wants PM to issue direction to stop these projects.

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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