An environmental imagination

 

Is ‘flood control’ even possible in geographies like the Brahmaputra valley with such a potent monsoon? Must every flood be a disaster?

This year’s flood in Assam has been devastating, although not unprecedented. In fact, floods in Assam have become an annual event, leaving millions of lives shattered every year and costing the state dearly. The scenes on our television screens and the social media feed leave us with a sense of déjà vu. These events are being normalised either as a natural disaster or, increasingly, as a climate change-induced phenomenon. It is a familiar story in other parts of eastern India as well, with Bihar being one of the worst-affected states.

While flash floods, a recurring event across Indian cities nowadays, are largely the result of poor urban planning and inefficient municipal administration, a flood has to be understood in relation to ‘flood control’ and, by extension, control of the river itself which poses larger, philosophical questions. This calls into attention our worldview on rivers, raising questions about how we imagine our ‘hydro-sociality’. Of further importance is to examine what one might call the ‘governmentality of floods’ — that is the power that an entire apparatus of institutions, practices, and technologies exercises vis-à-vis flood risk management.

Central to the Indian State’s flood management system is the construction of embankments which date back to the colonial era (although pre-colonial embankments also exist). Enough has been written about the perils of embankments and I will not go into those in this piece. Not only writings but songs have also been sung and films made about embankment-induced catastrophes. Way back in 1929, the American blues singers, Memphis Minnie & Kansas Joe McCoy, composed “When the Levee Breaks” (later reworked by Led Zeppelin) in the context of the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927.

Be it the levees on American rivers or the colonial and post-colonial embankments on Indian rivers, research has shown that far from controlling flood, these embankments have aggravated the flood crisis, rendering traditionally flood-dependent communities flood-vulnerable. Critique of an embankment-centric flood control approach has, at times, emerged from within the State itself. The 1980 Rashtriya Barh Ayog report, for instance, noted: “Flood control should not be considered as an end in itself, rather it is the means to an end. Flood control has to be viewed within the broad context of the economic and social development in the country. Management of floods should be considered in the context of the overall plan for management of the water resources of a river basin… The approach, therefore, cannot be static, but should remain dynamic and flexible.”

Rural communities realise the risks posed by embankments very well. In my own research sites in Majuli, Assam, villagers have often referred to embankments as “mrityu-baan” (weapons of death). Clearly, neither research nor local knowledge has been given due attention by policymakers. Little wonder then that even as Assam was drowning recently — largely due to embankment breaching — the water resources minister of the state promised, ironically, hundreds of kilometres of new embankments.

Why this obsession with embankments?

In my view, the embankment fetish of the State is rooted in two factors: first, the modernist ideology, a hubris, of human’s mastery over nature, that nature can be controlled and disciplined; second, and more importantly, it highlights two interrelated things: first is what the anthropologist, David Graeber, said about bureaucracy, that it is a “dead zone of imagination”. Thus, the hydraulic bureaucracy cannot think beyond embankments or similar structures, as evidenced by the case of Assam ever since the Assam Embankment and Drainage Act of 1953 came to pass. Almost like an automated entity, the bureaucracy carries on with embankments year after year. Second, the embankments seem to have become part of the ecosystem of the hydraulic bureaucracy, with deep roots and rhizomes, entangling multiple actors with various stakes. So everyone loves a weak embankment that requires repairing or rebuilding.

What is to be done? Is ‘flood control’ even possible in geographies like the Brahmaputra valley with such a potent monsoon? Must every flood be a disaster? Going back to the Rashtriya Barh Ayog’s recommendations, we must seriously consider watershed management and floodplain management at the basin level (thus requiring cooperation among riparian states and nations) while also pursuing various non-structural measures such as flood forecasting and warning, flood proofing, flood defence education, and capacity building of local communities and institutions. Deforestation of the Himalayas and its foothills must be stopped in order to reduce the force of the rivers in the monsoon. What if we built and revived a network of channels (like the ones that existed alongside rural roads and fields) that could absorb the excessive water in the monsoon? How about regulations on the types of permissible dwellings in flood-prone areas? There’s much to learn here from indigenous communities inhabiting the riverine geographies of the Brahmaputra for generations. A robust crop and livestock insurance system will also go a long way in checking floods. In short, we need a new environmental imagination if we are to co-inhabit these floodplains.

A resident of a riverside village in Majuli once told me: “Nodikhon bor komal, moromere subo lage” (The river is too delicate, it should be touched with love). How about we commit to that: to love our rivers, again?

Source"The Telegraph, 31/08/24

Author: Mitul Baruah

Cyclone Biparjoy: What is a cyclone and what are its types

 

The National Disaster Management Authority classifies cyclones broadly into two categories: extratropical cyclones and tropical cyclones. Here is what you need to know about them.

Developed in the Arabian Sea, cyclone Biparjoy, earlier expected to move towards the Pakistan coastline, has now changed its path and is heading towards the northern Gujarat coast with landfall expected on June 15.

According to India’s Regional Specialised Meteorological Centre (RSMC), the cyclone might cause storm surges of 2-3 metres in height, destruction of thatched houses, damage to pucca houses and roads, floodings, widespread damage to standing crops, plantations and orchards, and disruption of railways, powerlines and signalling systems in the northern and western coastal districts of Gujarat.

Cyclone Biparjoy, which is expected to generate wind speeds of 125-135 kmph with gusts reaching up to 150 kmph by the time it reaches land, is a tropical cyclone. The National Disaster Management Authority classifies cyclones broadly into two categories: extratropical cyclones and tropical cyclones. Here is what you need to know about them.

First, what is a cyclone?

A cyclone is a large-scale system of air that rotates around the centre of a low-pressure area. It is usually accompanied by violent storms and bad weather. As per NDMA, a cyclone is characterised by inward spiralling winds that rotate anticlockwise in the Northern Hemisphere and clockwise in the Southern Hemisphere.

What are extratropical cyclones?

Also known as mid-latitude cyclones, extratropical cyclones are those which occur outside of the tropic. They have “cold air at their core, and derive their energy from the release of potential energy when cold and warm air masses interact”, according to the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). It added that such cyclones always have one or more fronts — a weather system that is the boundary between two different types of air masses. One is represented by warm air and the other by cold air — connected to them, and can occur over land or ocean.

What are tropical cyclones?

Tropical cyclones are those which develop in the regions between the Tropics of Capricorn and Cancer. They are the most devastating storms on Earth. Such cyclones develop when “thunderstorm activity starts building close to the centre of circulation, and the strongest winds and rain are no longer in a band far from the centre,” NOAA noted. The core of the storm turns warm, and the cyclone gets most of its energy from the “latent heat” released when water vapour that has evaporated from warm ocean waters condenses into liquid water, the agency added. Moreover, warm fronts or cold fronts aren’t associated with tropical cyclones.

Tropical cyclones have different names depending on their location and strength. For instance, they are known as hurricanes in the Caribbean Sea, the Gulf of Mexico, the North Atlantic Ocean and the eastern and central North Pacific Ocean. In the western North Pacific, they are called typhoons.

Source: Indian Express, 13/06/23

An uncertain future

 

Existential threats that can haunt the earth in the near future are human-made — unintended consequences of our intense desire for material consumption and comfort

The world is challenged by many existential threats. Some of them are old, some more recent, and some hanging over a not-so-distant future. If one considers all the threats together, the forecast indeed induces a sense of foreboding. All the cheers of good tidings cannot overcome the possibility of a grim future. All these threats are human-made — unintended consequences of our intense desire for material consumption and comfort.

The first threat is an old one, that of nuclear weapons being used in an arena of war, leading to mass destruction. More countries than ever before are armed with growing numbers of deadly weapons. In most of these nations, the political leadership does not signal the maturity and responsibility that the ownership of these weapons demands. There are many related worries. Rogue terrorists could make nuclear weapons themselves, a task that is possible and relatively cheap. What is even more terrifying is the knowledge that not all nuclear weapons manufactured are accurately accounted for. Although no mishap has occurred so far, this does not mean that a disaster is impossible. Geopolitical tensions between India and Pakistan, between Russia and Ukraine, between North Korea and the United States of America are all flashpoints that might ignite without much warning.

The potential of nuclear disaster is aggravated by the fact that nations are moving away from global collaborations and cooperation to more inward-looking ideologies where the fear of and hatred for the foreigner and the immigrant are deeply entrenched. Fanned by political hot air from authoritarian leaders, this crude brand of nationalism survives and flourishes. Tension about the backlash of retreat from the globalisation of the last decade of the 20th century and the first decade of this century does not mean a return to the world of the 1980s. That is not possible anymore. Consumers have exhibited a huge appetite for goods and services from all over the world. New international supply chains had made that possible to a large extent. Now, with the growing political preference for protectionism, the supply chains are broken, while domestic production systems have not re-adjusted yet. Hence, costs of production have risen fast, as have inflationary pressures across the globe. Output growth is sluggish, with strong recessionary tendencies being witnessed even in some strong economies of the world.The global economic disorder,along with a disrupted financial sys­tem, is here to stay, at least for some time.

The magic of economic growth and material prosperity has accelerated the use of fossil fuels, resulting in ever-increasing carbon emissions. The unstoppable increase in emissions has brought the threat of climate change closer and closer. Now, most serious climate scientists believe that the average temperature rise is likely to be closer to 2° Celsius than 1.5° Celsius. At the moment, even a rise of 3° Celsius by the end of the century cannot be ruled out. The signs of climate change and the attendant unpredictable and unusual weather events have clea­rly shown that climate tipping points are much closer than we thou­ght. Climate change is, arguab­ly, the most important one of the long list of environmental threats looming on the horizon. The great growth story has resulted in a great acceleration in the use and depletion of critical natural resources such as fresh water, soil nutrients, forest cover, biodiversity, minerals and ocean ecosystems through acidification. Despite a long list of international meetings and agreements on the reduction of carbon emissions, there has been no success. As of now, the way the nations of the world are behaving, the targets of the Paris Agreement will remain unfulfilled. Economic development is unsustainable.

Last, but not the least, is the threat that appears as a seductive solution to many of humanity’s prob­lems of health, education and effective governance — the threat from the new technologies of artificial intelligence and machine learning. It has often been claimed with the wisdom of hindsight that new technologies are initially always sus­pected of displacing human beings from their jobs. However, all new technology has ultimately resulted in creating more jobs and made human life a little less trouble­some. This time, the emerging technology is qualitatively different from the older technologies, including the first wave of the information and communication technology re­volution. These new technologies can make a device take its own decisions, not necessarily sticking to the set of instructions given to it at the time of training. In this way, it takes something away from human beings. Moreover, the new technologies can be creative and generate new ideas on their own. Unlike the entire gamut of machines that humans have known and used since the Stone Age, the new ones will have autonomy and agency. Hence, they will ultimately be able to learn and act on their own. They will do­m­inate humans according to the laws of evolution and might ultimately displace us from being the most influential species on planet earth. The comparison of their intelligence and our own, according to some scientists, would be the difference between our brains and that of a frog’s. And we do not show a great deal of respect for the cerebral ability of frogs.

As these threats keep growing in magnitude over time, the cocktail effect can be quite deadly. All these threats increase vulnerabilities. These vulnerabilities, in turn, create insecurities. First of all, there will be a steady rise in insecurities of all sorts that will become manifest in everyday life. Insecurity about the loss of economic stability, insecurity about lethal diseases, about natural disasters like floods and fires, insecurity about displacement and, above all, insecurity about bodily suffering and death. Despite the staggering rise in global inequalities in income and wealth over the last 100 years, these insecurities will be felt by the rich and the poor alike. The rich might be able to defend themselves a little while longer than the poor, but ultimately the bell will toll for them too.

Human behaviour tends to be very defensive when faced with a variety of threats. Thin­king tends to become short-term and self-centred with a focus on survival. An alternative behavioural response is to believe that the threats are overstated and not immediate in nature. Then people have a marked tendency to ignore them altogether or assign unusually low probabilities of their occurrence. In the political arena, such threats are used to exploit the vulnerabilities and insecurities that arise. People look for distraction or salvation from threats. A political saviour who can distract attention, in whatever fashion, from the perils of the here and now would be considered a messiah. A charismatic false pro­ph­et who can make people forget their real condition could swiftly rise to the helm of power. People also wilfully accept greater control and authoritarianism, thereby relegating the responsibility over their own lives. The whole culture of fear and anxiety discourages the need to think freely. The authoritarian repressions of dialogue and dissent are not objected to. Most refuse to believe the terrible news. Instead, in the brave new world of forgetful­ness, they wear a smile on their fa­ces, and a badge of their leader on their chests.

Anup Sinha

Source: The Telegraph India

Disaster relief as a tool of outreach

After a devastating earthquake hit Turkey and Syria on February 7, killing at least 35,000 people as per available statistics, India promptly dispatched a relief and rescue team. Reacting within a few hours under Operation Dosti, India was among the first countries to respond to the earthquake.

 After a devastating earthquake hit Turkey and Syria on February 7, killing at least 35,000 people as per available statistics, India promptly dispatched a relief and rescue team. Reacting within a few hours under Operation Dosti, India was among the first countries to respond to the earthquake. Among the foreign policy responses India has devised over a period, humanitarian assistance and disaster relief has emerged as the most effective tool to make an effective intervention in support of life.

As is known, the region is prone to natural disasters, especially cyclones and floods. According to the Asian Development Bank, “People in Asia and the Pacific were displaced more than 225 million times due to disasters triggered by natural hazards from 2010 to 2021, accounting for more than three-quarters of the global number.” These statistics seriously reflect the challenges that confront the region. The ability to reach first in times of natural disasters, given the geographical location of India in the South Asian region, has been branded by various political leaders in New Delhi, defining its role as a “net security provider”.

India’s role in disaster relief has evolved over the years. To make its outreach effective and swift, India established the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) in 2005, which stands on four pillars: Prevention, Mitigation, Preparedness and Response. Though a recommendation to form such a mechanism had been made by a government-appointed high-powered committee in 1999, the Indian Ocean Tsunami perhaps awakened India to its capacity and ability to respond.

India’s National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) was established in 2008 as a dedicated force trained in disaster response. It has 15 battalions drawn from various paramilitary forces which are trained for the purpose. It has been at the forefront of India’s effort to reach out to countries that are facing an immense humanitarian crisis due to natural disasters. India has always responded to crises in the neighbourhood and beyond. However, only recently have the efforts become more efficient and better structured. The need for agencies like the NDRF was felt long back to enable India to respond swiftly to natural disasters within the country and in the immediate neighbourhood. The Indian Ocean Tsunami was the first major response of India in operationalising effective relief. India conducted relief and rescue operations by sending its navy when a powerful tsunami hit Sri Lanka and the Maldives in December 2004; it also extended support when Cyclone Sidr battered Bangladesh’s coast in 2007. In 2008, it extended help when Cyclone Nargis hit Myanmar though the military junta carried out the aid distribution.

India was the first country to dispatch the INS Sukanya and the INS Deepak with 1,200 tonnes of drinking water when a fire broke out at the water treatment plant in Male, resulting in a drinking water crisis in 2014. It became one of the first countries to reach Nepal during the 2015 earthquake when an NDRF team got there right after the disaster. Apart from extending help during natural disasters, India has provided relief to the Rohingya refugees and the local population under Operation Insaniyat.

Evacuation is another important aspect of India’s increasing profile for providing humanitarian assistance. It evacuated Indian nationals as well as 960 foreigners from 41 countries when civil war broke out in Yemen in April 2015 under Operation Rahat. Within six hours, India sent a rescue team and relief to Nepal in April 2015 under Operation Maitri led by the Indian Army.

Not only has India augmented its ability to emerge as a first responder, it has also established an early warning system to predict natural disasters, including tsunamis in the Indian Ocean. In 2014, it provided $1 million to a trust fund to establish an early warning system as part of the Indian Ocean Tsunami Warning and Mitigation System. The Indian-funded South Asia satellite that India launched helps in enhancing communication technology and disaster information transfer. Recently, the World Meteorological Department entrusted India with the responsibility of coordinating, developing and implementing the Regional Centre of South Asia Flash Flood Guidance System. India has been using it since 2020 to warn its neighbours of impending flash floods.

Capacity building of the neighbours is one of the priorities for India, apart from holding joint exercises to build interoperability. The South Asian Annual Disaster Management Exercises is one of them. India has several regional and international cooperation activities to carry its humanitarian assistance and disaster relief mission forward. However, it needs to engage more deeply in capacity building through training and joint exercises. There are the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC) disaster management exercises which are hosted by India, and the Indian Ocean Rim Association (IORA) exercises.

India, which defines its role as a first responder in the neighbourhood, has been efficient in reaching out in times of natural disasters. During the Covid-19 pandemic, it stood true to its role when it dispatched vaccines to countries in the neighbourhood. However, it could not live up to the expectation it had generated through its vaccine maitri outreach when it faced a severe second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic and stopped exporting vaccines. This created a crisis as neighbours scrambled for vaccines, which certainly created a dent in India’s credibility as a first responder.

To succeed in this role, India needs to engage in capacity building and joint exercises and work on interoperability between agencies. As disaster relief also requires engagement with locals, multi agency participation at the bilateral level is important. The 2022-23 budget of the External Affairs Ministry has earmarked INR 50 million for Disaster Relief under the heading Aid to Countries. Though this budget allocation appears minuscule, humanitarian assistance and disaster relief even featuring in the budget of the External Affairs Ministry shows that they have emerged as an important foreign policy instrument for India.

Smruti Pattanaik

Source: The Statesman, 17/02/23

Turkey earthquake: What causes an earthquake and why it cannot be predicted

 

Turkey earthquake: Prediction of an earthquake needs a precursory signal from within the earth that indicates a big quake is on the way. Currently, there is no equipment to find such a signal, even if they exist.

More than 1,500 people died and several hundred were injured after a major earthquake of magnitude 7.8 hit south-central Turkey and Northwest Syria on Monday early morning.

Turkey’s President Tayyip Erdoğan said that authorities are yet to determine how high the death toll might rise as search and rescue operations are still going on. AP news reported hundreds are still believed to be trapped under debris.

The US Geological Survey (USGS) said while the quake was centred about 33 km from Gaziantep, around 18 km deep, its effect was felt across West Asia, Northern Africa and South Eastern Europe with residents of Lebanon, Cyprus, Greece, Israel and Egypt also reporting tremors. India is among the 45 countries, which have so far offered assistance to Turkey. It’s sending search and rescue teams of the National Disaster Relief Force (NDRF) and medical teams along with relief material to the West Asian nation.

What is an earthquake?

An earthquake is an intense shaking of the ground caused by movement under the earth’s surface. It happens when two blocks of the earth suddenly slip past one another, according to USGS. This releases stored-up ‘elastic strain’ energy in the form of seismic waves, which spreads through the earth and cause the shaking of the ground.

What exactly causes earthquakes?

As we know, the earth’s outermost surface, crust, is fragmented into tectonic plates. The edges of the plates are called plate boundaries, which are made up of faults. The tectonic plates constantly move at a slow pace, sliding past one another and bumping into each other. As the edges of the plates are quite rough, they get stuck with one another while the rest of the plate keeps moving. Earthquake occurs when the plate has moved far enough and the edges unstick on one of the faults.

USGS says that “the location below the earth’s surface where the earthquake starts is called the hypocenter, and the location directly above it on the surface of the earth is called the epicentre.”

Can earthquakes be predicted?

No. An accurate prediction of an earthquake requires some sort of a precursory signal from within the earth that indicates a big quake is on the way. Moreover, the signal must occur only before large earthquakes so that it doesn’t indicate every small movement within the earth’s surface. Currently, there is no equipment to find such precursors, even if they exist.

Source: Indian Express, 7/02/23

Flood protection calls for a comprehensive approach

 Should we build embankments so close to rivers that they do not have the space needed to deposit silt and replenish ponds or recharge groundwater?

While the need for evolving a comprehensive and balanced flood protection policy has always been there, this need has become pressing in times of climate change when much heavier rain spells and higher flood flows are being seen. A balanced flood policy can contribute both in the short run and in the long run to considerably reduce the damage from floods and reduce their more destructive impacts. Sometimes a line is drawn between the ecological and engineering approaches to flood control. However, while drawing up a comprehensive policy, we need to look at both aspects. Coming to ecological aspects, there is no doubt that we need to considerably increase the green cover, particularly in the hilly and catchment areas. The Himalayan region is of the greatest importance. We should not make the mistake of confusing the commercial plantations and monocultures as forests.

We should try to protect all remaining natural forests and revive natural forests in degraded areas, all this with the cooperation and involvement of locals. Where new forests are being created, we should try to imitate native natural forests to the extent possible. We human beings may not be able to equal the ingenuity of nature, but we can try to come close to it. Flood waters have been generally best handled in the past by allowing them to spread considerably in the flood plains in such a way that large parts of them find their way to ponds, lakes, tanks, and wetlands. This way depleted water sources are filled up and there is significant recharge of groundwater which will help us during the dry months, while at the same time the immediate danger is reduced. For this to happen, these water bodies must be safe and secure, free from encroachments, ready to welcome and absorb the flood water.

In all construction and development works, drainage should get adequate attention and no final approval or final payments should be granted till the drainage component has been properly completed. More problems arise if the flood waters stay on for a long time due to drainage obstruction and fewer problems are seen if the flood waters leave quickly. A guest is considered a good guest if she or he does not overstay and leaves behind a gift or two. If a flood leaves rather quickly after depositing some fertile silt and replenishing the drying water bodies, then it is a good flood. It is therefore important that we create the conditions in which a flood can become relatively good, or at least not such a bad flood. The most common way of controlling floods has been to build embankments. But we cannot go on building embankments along all rivers. We must be selective and learn from experience which can warn us of several possible mistakes. Should we build embankments so close to rivers that they do not have the space needed to deposit silt and replenish ponds or recharge groundwater?

The answer must be in the negative. But if the embankments are to be built some distance away, we must have the will and the resources for the proper care and rehabilitation of people in areas between the river and the embankment. At best embankments have only a limited role and a wise engineer will learn to be selective, knowing where to build and where not to build. We cannot look only at immediate protection. We must consider what happens after five or ten years. We should not forget that when breaches occur in embankments, the floods unleashed can be much more destructive. What we should always remember is that in several areas where many embankments have been built, flood damage is still heavy and perhaps heavier than before. Without resolving this contradiction, we cannot go on building more embankments. A lot of money in the name of flood control has been spent on dams, but again we must reckon with the difficult fact that many destructive floods are being caused by very heavy release of dam waters.

To reduce such possibilities, flood reduction should receive more importance in dam management. Secondly, steps to check rapid siltation of dam reservoirs should be taken. Dam safety and safe management practices should get more attention. Beyond this, there is a need to reconsider several adverse impacts of damming rivers as adequate caution has not always been exercised by quickly approving hazardous projects that may pass the scrutiny of an honest cost-benefit appraisal. In urban areas, the tendency to encroach on riverbeds, and/or on natural waterways, for various construction activities must be checked. The clearing of drains must be better, and garbage which clogs drains and obstructs water flow must be minimized.

We must realize that floods have always been with us and will always be with us, particularly in those countries where rain tends to be concentrated in a relatively short season of three or four months. The challenge is to handle them in ways which will make them less destructive while enjoying their bounty of water recharge and fertile silt deposition.

A version of this story appears in the print edition of the September 1, 2022, issue.

BHARAT DOGRA

Source: The Statesman, 1/09/22

Behind the unprecedented pre-monsoon devastation in Assam

 

While the monsoons are yet to arrive, Assam has already been beset by floods and landslides that have left 15 people dead and more than 7 lakh affected.

The monsoons bring destruction to Assam like a clockwork almost every year. However, this year, while the monsoons are yet to arrive, the state has already been beset by floods and landslides that have left 15 people dead and more than 7 lakh affected. The hill district of Dima Hasao, in particular, has been ravaged by flash floods and landslides, with connectivity to the rest of the state snapped.

What is behind this unprecedented devastation?

Experts point out that there are a combination of factors. First, extraordinarily acute pre-monsoon rains. While the average rainfall for the period of March 1 to May 20 in Assam is 434.5 mm, the corresponding number for this year is 719 mm. That amounts to a 65 per cent excess. That is a “large excess”, according to the Indian Meteorological Department. The neighbouring state of Meghalaya has recorded an even greater excess: of 137 per cent.

“Normally we have rains coming in June and July when we experience big floods,” said Dr DC Goswami, an eminent environmentalist and a retired professor of hydrology from the Gauhati University. “This time it has come with a bang. The difference is the timing and scale.” Goswami attributed the changes in “rainfall intensity, arrival and departure times” to climate change.

Partha Jyoti Das, who heads the Water, Climate and Hazard Division of the Guwahati-based environment non-profit Aaranyak, concurred. “Because of climate change, there are more and more concentrated rain and heavy rainfall episodes,” said Das.

He added that it was even more worrisome since the southwest monsoons were expected early (end May) in the northeast region this year. “There may be little respite between the recession of this pre-monsooBut it is not just floods that have wreaked destruction. There have been several episodes of landslides, especially in south Assam’s Dima Hasao and Cachar districts. At least three people have been buried alive in Dima Hasao’s Haflong. In a particularly horrific incident, mudslides washed away a portion of the rail tracks that connect the south of Assam with the rest of the country. The New Haflong railway station was also severely damaged with bogeys of a train at the station overturning under the force of landslide-induced debris. Portions of the road connecting Guwahati to Dima Hasao, and beyond to Barak Valley districts, have caved in.nal flood and the advent of the first monsoonal flood surge, especially in Assam,” he said.

But what is causing these landslides?

Das said that while landslides in that part of the state are not unheard of, the scale and the intensity was higher than usual. Das blamed this on the “undesirable, unpragmatic, unplanned structural intervention on the fragile landscape of hills”.

A case in point is the Lumding-Badarpur railway line. The affected railway line that connects Lumding in central Assam to Badarpur in south Assam and passes through the hill district of Dima Hasao was expanded into a broad gauge in 2015. The expansion work of this much-delayed project had begun in 1997, but the tricky landscape meant progress was woefully slow. Besides, the expansion project was marred by several red flags and even after its  inauguration, there have been accusations about it having flouted safety norms.  The current spate of landslides have affected the line in at least 58 spots, said railways officials. The trains in that section stand cancelled till July 1.

Das said that the damage to the line suggested what many had been pointing out for years: that corners may have been cut in carrying out the construction.

Apart from the railway line itself, residents of Dima Hasao say that the district has seen hectic construction, both of public infrastructure like roads and private property, in recent times. “Over the years, there has not only been massive deforestation for the extension of the railway line and the four-line highway, there has also been rampant riverbed mining often done in collusion with the district authorities,” said Uttam Bathari, a historian and professor at Gauhati University, who hails from Haflong.

Also, allegations abound of roads being built over streams and spring water sources – the reason, many say, so many roads have caved in.

Mirza Zulfiqur Rahman, an independent researcher based in Guwahati, said similar hastily carried out infrastructure developmental work in Arunachal Pradesh had led to an increase in landslides in the state in recent years. This month itself, five people have been killed. “Construction is sped up in the name of national security in Arunachal and improving connectivity elsewhere in Northeast India,” alleged Rahman.

Das of Aaranyak said that construction needed to be “tuned to the ecological fragility of the region”.

Goswami also spoke of “conscious construction” and an “integrated holistic approach across state boundaries”.

Rahman suggested keeping “traditional knowledge systems in mind” and involving  the local community to build “sustainable infrastructure”. “As long as it is top-down it will depend on the masculinist engineering bureaucracies,” he said.

Blaming climate change for everything was not enough, said Rahman. “We have to look back at the mess we have created on the ground level in combination with climate change to account for such disasters.”

Written by Tora Agarwala

Source: Indian Express, 21/05/22

Large hydro projects risk Himalayan communities

 The Uttarakhand tragedy is a moment to review support for Himalayan dams and construction-based economy.The impact of the February 7 flash floods in Uttarakhand is still being estimated while rescue and relief operations remain challenged and the death toll rises. The tragedy has brought into sharp focus the environmental risks to the Himalayan people and to the region’s development. This is a moment for all our decision-makers in state governments, courts and Parliament to review their support for Himalayan dams.In recent years, the central government’s unconditional push on renewable energy (RE) has motivated the Himalayan states to seek RE status for the hydropower sector. In March 2019, the Cabinet granted this status to all hydropower projects, effectively removing the earlier policy distinction between projects up to 25 MW and larger ones. This decision came after the standing committee of the ministry of power observed that Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions of hydropower stations “is even lesser than solar projects” and that the “net effect of hydro projects has always been positive for the surrounding”.

This position signals grave risks for all Himalayan communities, as it could make this ecologically sensitive region the densest hydropower zone in the world. As the committee report shows, the reassessment of large dams as RE has been done with the sole aim of attracting energy finance for hydropower development in the Himalayan region, stated to be “abundant” in water resources.

Globally, climate policy debates now take energy transition as a given. The spatial aspects of this ongoing global energy transition, especially the participation of state governments in electricity decarbonisation, are crucial to understand. Energy transition policies and projects are creating new “clean energy” geographies and new energy politics around RE.

India’s re-engagement with large hydro is one such regional dynamic. It has drawn small, border Himalayan states into global and national climate and energy discourses. As the representative of Uttarakhand stated to the parliamentary committee, “Solar energy, wind energy or any other form of renewable energy is always going to be smaller. For us, as a state in the Himalayas, hydro is our main stake.”

The ambitions of the Indian Himalayan states to seize the energy transition narrative illustrates what climate scholars identify as a shift from “burden-sharing to opportunity-sharing” in climate policies. The parliamentary committee report details several attempts by state representatives to persuade national policymakers to recognise that India’s energy transition pathways necessarily include the politically delegitimised and ecologically damaging large hydro.

Governments anticipate a number of developmental benefits of energy transition such as cheaper, reliable energy for economic development, revenues from export of “green” fuel, access to international development finance, and increased local business opportunities. These are referred to as “co-benefits” in climate policy discourses. Co-benefits are crucial to justify the exemptions, concessions and incentives given upfront by states to attract private investments for large-scale RE projects. These discourses have been applied to policymaking in the “Himachal model” of private hydro-development. The state’s policies guarantee purchase of power, easy and cheap land transfers and exemptions from local consent.

The hydro sector is still dominated by public sector units due to their access to long-term finance and State guarantees.

Despite several policy changes, the share of the private sector has remained low as compared to private investments in the coal power sector. The committee report shows the Himalayan state representatives and the hydropower bureaucracy stating unambiguously that the RE status and accompanied incentives are needed to attract private investments to the sector. The RE tag is a means to create new investment opportunities in the hydro sector for financial elites and energy capital.

The social and environmental risks of large dams are well-documented. Although the committee’s report records that “geological surprises” resulting from weak Himalayan geology, “lack of technology or expertise, natural calamities like landslides, floods, and cloud bursts etc cause severe setbacks in construction schedules”, the committee didn’t see these as problems that require in-depth examination. Instead, the report dedicates its attention to reducing the financial risk to existing and potential dam-builders.

In an effort to attract investments from the private sector that is reluctant to venture into “remote” Himalayan locations, government agencies are willing to undertake construction of “enabling infrastructure” at public cost. Himalayan road construction, that has a serious impact, should be seen as an integral part of incentivising private hydro-development in this region.

The standing committee report is an excellent example of the opportunistic use of RE and how the development of private hydro-finance overtakes the assessment of social and environmental risks of dams.

Manju Menon and Kanchi Kohli are with the Centre for Policy Research

Source: Hindustan Times, 19/02/21

Award-winning Assamese film bridges understanding about the annual deluge

 A little after day break, they stood waist-deep in water, balancing their cameras — and themselves — against the push and pull of the mighty Brahmaputra. At many points, they nearly slipped and fell, at the mercy of the mercurial river. But they called it a day only seven long hours later — for that is how long it took director Kripal Kalita to get what he wanted: a two-minute-clip that had his main characters, two children, guide their epileptic mother through an inundated field. “It was risky, but worth it,” Kalita says, “To make a movie on the floods, you have to truly experience it, you have to live it.”

And that is what Kalita’s debut feature film Bridge, which bagged the ‘Special Mention’ award, at the International Film Festival of India (IFFFI) in Goa last month – is about: living with — and overcoming — the Assam floods.

Kalita is no stranger to the annual tragedy, the baan in Assamese. “One day, you have your home, your family, your animals, your land— and the next day you may have nothing,” he says.While Kalita can speak from experience (having grown up in Niz Defeli, a small low-lying village in Baksa’s Tamulpur Circle), it is not his story, but several news reports he has read over the years that make up Bridge. “At the end of 2017, I read about a girl who, worried about her future, asked the local MLA to build a small bridge in their village. Another time, I saw heart-breaking visuals of kids wading their way to school, books and clothes bundled up on their heads,” Kalita recalls.

Incidents like this are so frequent in Assam during the floods that they are rarely surprising for the locals. But not Kalita. Starting December 2017, he worked on building the character of Jonaki (played by Shiva Rani Kalita), the 17-year-old protagonist of his film, her life loosely based on such true incidents. “Her father is swept away by the waters, her mother falls ill and the burden of taking care of her little brother falls on her shoulders,” says Kalita, “At 17, she builds a house, ploughs the fields, takes care of her brother and her ailing mother. In many ways, her story could be the story of many young girls in Assam.”

But the film is not just about the weight that pulls you down, but also the ability of humans to stay afloat — “After all, life must go on,” Kalita says. And that is one of the key takeaways from Bridge, a film centred around a demand of the local populace for a bridge over the little tributary, whose waters cut them off every monsoon. “While a seemingly physical demand, the bridge can be metaphorical too,” says Kalita, “The floods don’t just cut you off from the rest of the world, but it also snaps relationships, ambitions and dreams.”

Kalita’s crew started filming in May 2018. And the schedule lasted 14 months, primarily in the flood-ravaged districts of Upper Assam, including Dhemaji, Golaghat, Lakhimpur and Tinsukia. “My aim was to make it as real as possible,” says the 43-year-old filmmaker and theatre actor, who was trained under noted Manipuri theatre personality, Heisnam Kanhailal. “Our story is set across all seasons, so we actually made it a point to shoot it like that — in shine, in thunder, in rain.”

The 89-minute-long Assamese language film, which is now making its rounds in the film festival circuit, has no background score, no make up on actors. “I made the actors live in the village for three months, plough the fields, walk in the mud — it had to be as authentic as possible,” says Kalita, “As authentic as what we face every year.”

“If it’s one thing that is pulling Assam down — it’s the floods. And a lack of solution to the problem,” says Kalita, “And mind you, this is something we have lived with for centuries. Even Sukapha, the founder of the Ahom dynasty, was compelled to change his capital multiple times because of the floods.”

That said, it is important to remember that floods are something Assam — through which the Brahmaputra flows — has to live with.

Just like Kalita’s characters do in the film. In one poignant scene, the brother, angry at all the river has taken from his young life, shouts in rage, “I will bury this river, it has destroyed our home, killed our father, spoilt our sister’s wedding.”

But his sister gently tells him that the river had bred civilisation, given them food and water, and enabled them to farm their lands. “It can never be our enemy,” she says.

Source: Indian Express, 6/02/21

What women need in post-disaster situations

Studies show that natural disasters tend to lower life expectancy more in women than in men.

The recent Bihar floods and flood alert warnings in Kerala are just the latest in a long line of natural disasters that periodically strike in India, leaving behind a trail of devastation. The focus afterwards is on assessing the loss of lives and economic cost and, of course, rehabilitation. But though it is well known, the gender dimension of such disasters is not emphasised enough.

Studies show that natural disasters tend to lower life expectancy more in women than in men. This has to do with their lack of physical ability to get to safety, their sacrificing their safety for their children and elders, and their cumbersome clothing. Apart from this, in the aftermath of a disaster, women are much more vulnerable to trafficking, rape, and violence. After the Nepal earthquake, there were reports of women and children being preyed upon by traffickers. Given the inadequate socio-economic resources available to them, women also find it more difficult to rebuild their lives after disasters. They have limited livelihood avenues, little access to loans, and little knowledge of relief and rehabilitation available to them.

The psychological stress they face from witnessing devastation and seeing their families in danger or being killed is rarely addressed. In fact, in India, trauma counselling after natural disasters is not seen as a priority nor is trained personnel easily available. In such situations, her access to economic and educational resources gets even more restricted. Then, there are the problems that women face in camps away from their homes after disasters. Here, they are not only faced with danger in the form of predators but also suffer from hygiene problems. After the Kerala floods last year, despite the efforts of the state government, women suffered due lack of privacy and compromised reproductive health.

Our disaster management does not take into account practical ways to help women overcome some or all of these issues. The first is to engage with the woman on her needs. From this will flow support on rehabilitation, access to finance, sanitation and legal help. She will also need psychological support. The task of rebuilding their lives in unfamiliar surroundings is overwhelming for many women who have not had any exposure to the outside world or the educational and social tools to deal with this.

There are services available for women in post-disaster situations, but the problem is that in many cases they neither know about these, and, if they do, they have no means to access them. In disaster rehabilitation and response efforts, a lot of programmes by different organisations are being directed to benefit women. But there remains a wide gap between the availability of services provided to women and women’s ability to access these services. When and if she is able to get hold of governmental assistance, she is vulnerable to being exploited by touts or even members of her own family who can either trick or coerce her into parting with it.

In the case of the elderly women, all these factors are magnified. But unfortunately, after each disaster, women are at best subjected to ad hoc measures. They are not involved in relief efforts and hence left out of all decision-making. This was so even in literate and progressive Kerala.

Let us be clear, natural disasters are likely to increase thanks to climate change. Undoubtedly, our response mechanisms have improved. But it is still to become more holistic and look at the specific needs of women. I wonder what has happen to the women displaced in the Kedarnath landslide, the Kerala floods, the Bihar floods. Where are they now and how have they rebuilt their broken lives?

A documentation of this would be a good place to begin addressing this issue more seriously.

Source: Hindustan Times, 28/10/2019

Dark recesses

Meghalaya tragedy reveals absence of regulation, state complicity in rat-hole mining

In 2014, the National Green Tribunal (NGT) had banned rat-hole coal mining. (Source: Meghalaya Police)

The mining tragedy at Ksan, in Lumthari, East Jaintia Hills, Meghalaya would have gone unreported had there not been a lone survivor — Sayeb Ali of Panbari, Assam. This is not the first time that a tragedy has struck the state’s rat-hole mines. If this inhuman form of coal mining is not halted completely, we can be sure that many more labourers will be buried because mine caving accompanied with flooding is not an unknown phenomenon.

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In 1992, nearly 30 mine labourers in South Garo Hills were caught in a similar flood — about half of them escaped death somehow. The rest were never found. In 2012, 15 miners were buried in a mine in Garo Hills. Their bodies too were not recovered. Most of the mine workers are migrant labourers, forced by stark poverty to undertake this hazardous work.

Nearly three weeks after the disaster in Ksan, pumps were sourced from the Odisha Fire Service. These can suck out 1,600 litres per minute. However, the water in the mine remained at the same level. Similar pumps were deployed to pump out water from the surrounding abandoned mines as well but the water level went down by a mere six inches. The pump manufacturing company, Kirloskar Brothers, had earlier talked of sending100 HP pumps but these have not yet arrived at the accident site, and water continues to leak into the ill-fated mine. Mining expert Jaswant Singh Gill, who is known for having rescued 65 miners in 1989 from the Mahabir mines in Raniganj, West Bengal, has rightly asked: Do the agencies present at the site, the NDRF, the Indian Navy divers and mining engineers from Coal India Ltd, have knowledge of the area’s topography? And can they get a handle on where exactly the water is flowing into the mine in order to drain out its source or seal it completely?

On December 29, when I visited the mine, the NDRF told me that the water is 176-feet deep. The navy divers cannot plunge straight into a perpendicular hole, which branches out into horizontal rat holes. They are trained to dive into the sea and in open waters, not into a hole that is barely 10 square feet. The mine in the Jaintia Hills is not likely to have enough oxygen, even though it is said to have some air pockets. Moreover, the water inside is very cold, perhaps even freezing — we experienced this while crossing the knee-deep Lytein river at three places to reach the mine site. One ardently hopes that the miners can survive the cold inside, considering this is winter.

On visiting the mine site, one gets the impression that the rescue personnel, while giving their best, don’t actually know what’s in store for them. The East Khasi Hills District Administration has been found wanting from day one. Much time was lost before the rescue operation was launched. I put this down to the absence of a Standard Operation Procedure for such a mining disaster. The mines are privately owned and do not follow any regulatory protocol. When an accident happens, the administration is caught in a bind and does not know what to do first or how to go about it.

There was delay in requisitioning the high-powered pumps and the NDRF is right in saying that the district administration should have been equipped with these pumps in the first place, given the history of mining disasters in the region. The state government was caught napping. Meghalaya Chief Minister Conrad Sangma is yet to visit the site. Two of his ministers, including the minister for disaster management who actually represents the area in the state legislature, visited the site two weeks after the accident. Perhaps the government is embarrassed at being caught unawares.

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Just two weeks before the disaster, Sangma and a few other Meghalaya ministers, denied that coal mining was continuing illegally in the state after the National Green Tribunal banned it in 2014. But their statements were essentially meant to convince the Supreme Court that all the coal lying near the collieries was mined before the NGT ban. The pleas had the desired effect: Last month, the Court allowed transportation of coal till January 31. But the mine disaster has exposed the state government’s lie.

The Meghalaya disaster did not get the kind of media attention that an accident in Thailand in June last year did — a school football team strayed into a cave even when there were clear instructions not to enter it. The cave was flooded and the boys could not find their way out. India sent Kirloskar pumps to drain out the water from the cave. British navy divers finally rescued the 13 boys. But Meghalaya is in the back of beyond and when the state government is slow in seeking help, because it has to defend its own back, things are bound to go awry. What comes out clearly from this incident is that the lives of the poor and the voiceless don’t really matter, not to the mine owner, not to the state government certainly not the Centre, and not even to large sections of the media. We live in our own bubbles.

Coal mining in Meghalaya enjoys political patronage because elections are funded by coal barons. Several elected MLAs are coal-mine owners. In fact, it would be interesting to find out which politician, which bureaucrat and which police official does not own a coal mine. The MP from Shillong constituency, Vincent Pala, and his family, own mines. Recently Pala raised a zero hour motion on the mine tragedy but instead of calling for strict action against illegal mining, he pleaded for the legalisation of rat hole mining. This is a blatant display of self-interest

Source: Indian Express, 4/01/2019