Environment ministry enabling corporate takeover of India

It is ironic that Prime Minister Narendra Modi called on the world recently to do more to tackle plastic pollution and other environmental issues. “India is the fastest-growing economy in the world today. We are committed to realising the standards of our people in a way that is sustainable and green,” Modi said at an event to mark World Environment Day, which India hosted this year on June 5.

The irony just does not stem from the fact that Narendra Modi had spoken like a true blue climate change sceptic in his Teachers’ Day interaction with students on September 5, 2014. Modi had then said, “Older people – 70, 80 and 90 years old – say in winter ‘this time it’s colder than last year’. Actually, it’s not colder. People lose their ability to tolerate cold as they grow older. In the same way, the climate hasn’t changed. We have changed.”

It rather comes from the signals his tenure as the major domo of the nation has sent out to industrialists and individuals and organisations working for environmental conservation and protection.

The first move came with the dilution of the Forest Rights Act, 2006 by taking away the right of tribal village councils to oppose an industrial project. After the dilution, their consent was not required to exploit tribal lands and cut down forests. Then, the Modi government attempted to reconstitute the National Board for Wildlife by reducing the number of independent directors on its boards. This would have eroded the autonomy of the board and turned it into a toothless body. This was reversed after it was severely criticised in the Supreme Court. Then came the National Waterways Act in 2016, which marked over hundred of India’s rivers as National Waterways. Widespread construction in ecologically sensitive zones will surely destroy marine flora and fauna. Construction of railway lines and high-tension power lines through the dense forests of the Western Ghats has also been given the go-ahead. Thousands of trees have been felled.

At a time when North India went through one of the worst smog episodes last winter, the Modi government has traded peoples’ health for profits of power companies. It needs to be mentioned here that Union Environment Minister Harsh Vardhan dismissed the smog as just a scare.

This government is also unique in the sense that it has done away with the need for environmental checks before sanctioning a project. It has been reworking rules that have permitted firms to retrospectively apply for environmental clearance after their projects have already taken off. This has allowed violators the best deal. They can now commit violations and then pay the compensation, using the Environmental Impact Assessment route. Their project would continue unabated.

A government committee has in fact recommended replacing environmental impact assessments (EIAs) with a system of “utmost good faith”.

This means a promoter can get clearance for a project on the basis of a declaration of its environmental impact, instead of the government conducting any study.

The Central Wetland Regulatory Authority has been dissolved and powers devolved to states. Then, a project as controversial as river-linking is being given serious thought, a project that has the potential to disrupt the entire life process in the nation by altering river flow.

How can one forget exempting coal mining from public hearings and allowing irrigation projects without clearances? The Environment ministry under the Modi rule has, thus, become a tool for resource accumulation by a select few and for the exclusion of the poor and the locals from decision-making processes.

Lifting the moratorium on new industries in the critically polluted areas of Ghaziabad, Indore, Jharsuguda, Ludhiana, Panipat, Patancheru-Bollaram, Singrauli and Vapi is another case in point.

The ministry has further reduced the parameters for determining if forestland can be exploited for mining and industry. The ministry now uses four parameters instead of six.

The environment ministry has relaxed Forest Conservation Act norms for road, rail and other public works projects that involve cutting trees in forest areas.

This government has ordered greater scrutiny of the bank accounts of five American environmental NGOs but has not given a reason.

Greenpeace, Avaaz, Bank Information Centre, the Sierra Club and 350.org now need home ministry clearance for every transfer of funds from overseas.

Responding to a legal challenge by Greenpeace, the home ministry told the Delhi High Court in 2014 that the organisation was working against “national interest” by opposing government policies. The Modi regime, acting on its principal tenet of Us vs Them has turned even environmental activism into an anti-national act.

The Environment Ministry under the Modi regime is not just a rubber stamp department. It has become an active enabler of private and corporate takeover of the country’s resources which belong to every citizen and specially the local inhabitants. This has been the mandate of the Modi government which came to power through its collusion with the industry. The Environment Ministry is just one tool by which the government is paying the industry back.

It is not just the Nirav Modis who are running away with our money and people will do well to understand that.