The Hindu : Other States / Maharashtra News : Environment safeguards yet to be completed

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Apr 13, 2005

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Other States - Maharashtra

Environment safeguards yet to be completed

By Meena Menon

MUMBAI, APRIL 12 . The height of the controversial Sardar Sarovar Dam continues to rise even though various environmental safeguards are yet to be implemented. On April 7, the environment sub-group of the Narmada Control Authority (NCA) met to review the various measures to be completed before the height of the dam is increased.

On January 6 the sub group gave the clearance for raising the dam height from 110.64 metres to 121.92 metres and asked the party states — Gujarat, Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh — to implement all the environmental safeguards in letter and spirit.

Shekhar Singh, member of the sub group, however says: "Most of the conditions were to be completed by March 31 but now the governments have promised they will be completed by April-end.

The data presented says the conditions are not fulfilled. This is clearly a violation of the Supreme Court order which specifies that every increase of 10 metres must take place after completion of both rehabilitation and environmental safeguards."

Aerial surveys are being proposed to verify if the governments have completed their tasks.

They cannot merely state that they have completed compensatory afforestation or catchment area treatment. They are subject to verification.

"The NCA is not a rubber stamping group. The government's statements have to be verified," Mr. Singh said.

The project was granted environmental clearance on June 24, 1987, by the Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) at the instance of then Prime Minister, Rajiv Gandhi. Eight conditions were to be fulfilled by December 1989. According to the NCA's documents, a meeting on September 7, 1990 recorded that the environment clearance was deemed to have lapsed, as these conditions had not been fulfilled.

This was evident at the January meeting of the NCA's environment sub-group where the Maharashtra Government, for instance, pleaded shortage of funds for not implementing planned measures for environmental safeguards.

In Madhya Pradesh, though submergence has already started, measures to protect environment in accordance with the plans are not yet complete.

The conditional clearance issued by the Ministry of Environment required implementation of the plan for protective/ameliorative and restorative measures for protection of flora and fauna.

Gaps in compliance

The sub-group in January had reviewed the implementation of the environmental action plans and preparedness of the project authorities for completion of the remaining works. Members of the sub-group observed that there was substantial compliance in most areas but there are still gaps that required to be filled by concrete action on the ground by the states involved.

Since the states of Gujarat, Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh gave an assurance that they would complete the remaining work by March 2005, the sub-group gave permission for the height of the dam to be raised to 121.92 metres.

However, abstracts of the Action Taken Reports submitted by the three party states indicated that the situation was far from satisfactory.

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