The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : Environmental monitoring of dredging on: N.K. Raghupathy

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, Sep 11, 2005

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Environmental monitoring of dredging on: N.K. Raghupathy

Staff Reporter

"Ecological impact as important as future economic gains" N.K. Raghupathy says round-the-clock monitoring of Sethusamudram project will not be compromised

ENVIRONMENTALISTS MEET: Mike Connor, British Deputy High Commissioner, South India (left), greeting P. M. Belliappa, vice-president, Association of British Scholars, at a seminar in Chennai on Saturday. M. C. Mehta, Senior Advocate, Supreme Court (ri ght) looks on. — Photo: K. V. Srinivasan

CHENNAI: The round-the-clock environmental monitoring of dredging work being carried out for the Sethusamudram ship canal project will never be compromised, N.K. Raghupathy, chairman of Tuticorin Port Trust, the implementing authority of ongoing Rs. 2,427-crore project, said on Saturday.

Participating in a seminar on "critical environment issues" organised by the Association of British Scholars and the British Council, Mr. Raghupathy told an audience of environmentalists, bureaucrats and students that the dredging work off the Bay of Bengal was being monitored by a team from the Alagappa Institute of Technology. Mr. Raghupathy said the project was being handled sensitively and its ecological impact was as important to the project managers as the future economic gains that would accrue . "We will try our best to complete the project by the deadline of 2008."

Upon completion, the Sethusamudram canal will run a length of 89 km. The project involves the creation of two channels: one across Adam's Bridge, a chain of islets and shallow waters between India and Sri Lanka, and the other across the Palk Straits. The construction will involvedredging and deepening of the sea, a move that has attracted strong criticism from environmentalists.

Ecology unchanged

Reacting to a question on whether the tsunami had affected the sea ecology, Mr. Raghupathy said two recent studies had shown that the local ecology was by and large unchanged.

"The rapid environmental assessment carried out by the directorate of environment and another assessment on health of corals have shown that the project areas have been the least affected. Only a specific kind of coral — the cup coral — in some areas were partially bleached."

Senior Supreme Court advocate and Ramon Magsaysay winner M.C. Mehta said coastal areas throughout the country faced several threats and that the coastal zone regulation authorities were ineffective. Environmental refugees were on the raise every day. Earlier, British Deputy High Commissioner for South India Mike Connor inaugurated the meet.

Eunice Crook, Director, British Council, South India, delivered the valedictory address.

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