Lessons from Uttarakhand Disaster

It was a blitz for the people of Uttarakhand, the rain really struck lakhs of people and taken away around ten thousand lives. Was it an unexpected disaster? While clamoring like this calamity would have avoided, the question remains is what actions government would have taken to reduce the impact of the tragedy? 

 

Natural Calamities are not a new phenomenon to the inhabitants of Uttarakhand. The unscientific and unplanned way of development made this disaster more worst. Illegal mining, unauthorized construction and similar environmental exploitation caused damage to the ecological fragile Himalayan region. While considering the young topography and loose soil structure of Himalayan region, deforestation and construction of huge dams create impact beyond our imagination. It is apparent that when the destination exceeds its carrying capacity, it normally responds. This is what happened in Uttarakhand. 

Exploration and exploitation of land and resources for tourism and profit make theses region more vulnerable to environmental disasters. It is noticed that around 250 tourism properties have been washed away in sever rain and flood because of its lack of base support and grit. In another way all these construction was against the green agenda and policy of MoEF.The importance of this region now becomes Tourism rather than pilgrimage and it is not pilgrims but tourists visits this place. The most disturbing fact is that most of the pilgrim centres like Badiranadh,Yamuna Gnagothri etc. are operating without any proper sewage waste treatment system that forced Ganga and Yamuna to receive all kind of filth and human excreta.

Construction of dams and high raise building increase the concern.The Tehri Dam has been the object of protests by environmental organizations and local people of the region. The Tehri dam is located in the Central Himalayan Seismic Gap, a major geologic fault zone. At the same time people say that it is not serving its purpose, only 12% water reaches Uttarakhand region and remaining major portion flows to neighboring states. Some critics argue that the power generation of Tehri is around 300 MW against the capacity 2400 MW.

The alarming rate of melting of Himalayan glaciers raises an impending crisis. Issues like global warming and pollution increases the atmospheric temperature that creates huge environmental impact in eco fragile region of Himalayas. A study – led by professors Lonnie Thompson of Ohio State University and Yao Tandong, director of the Institute of Tibetan Research at the Chinese Academy of Sciences – studied 30 years of data on over 7000 glaciers in the Himalayas and the Tibetan Plateau. They found that about nine per cent of the ice present in the 1970s had shrunk over that period, thought to be a more reliable basis for measuring climate change. And where they had separate data for different decades during that time they found it showed that the melting was accelerating.

 

It is the high time to arise and awake for the protection of Himalayan eco system to to keep ourselves away from a fast approaching disaster.