No nod for new projects in Upper Ganga: Prakash Javadekar

Union Minister for Environment, Forests and Climate Change Prakash Javadekar on Monday said the ministry will not grant permissions for any new projects in the Upper Ganga reaches. The projects which have already received clearance, however, will not be affected, the minister said.

Javadekar’s comments come in the backdrop of a flash flood that hit the Chamoli district of Uttarakhand in February, killing over 50 people and causing widespread damage to a hydropower project in the area.

Speaking in the Rajya Sabha, Javadekar also said six leading institutes of the country, including ISRO, DST and the Himalayan Studies Mission, are studying the effect of climate change on glaciers

According to Javadekar, the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC) is “creating a mechanism” to continuously audit afforestation each year. This information will be put out on a public platform to ensure transparency, he said.

The Ministry has been releasing CAMPA or compensatory afforestation funds in lieu of clearing forests for developmental projects.

In his speech, Javadekar also pointed out that according to the ‘Global Carbon budgets and Equity in Climate Change’, published in 2010, historical carbon space shared by India is just 3 percent compared to United States’s 29 percent, 45 percent of all other developed countries and China’s 10 percent.

Replying to a question by MP M Shanmugam on the government’s stand on the Paris Climate Agreement with respect to carbon space, Javadekar emphasised the need for developed countries to take responsibility for their historic carbon emissions, and India’s role in unifying developing countries in asking for their fair share of financial and technical support.