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print versionThe Times of India, December 14, 2021
by CP Rajendran *
The ‘Char Dham Pariyojana’ is a fundamental violation of all environmental norms and conservation strategies that need to be followed in the Himalayan mountain terrains for any constructional activities. From environmental impact assessment (EIA), forest clearances to circulars, concealment of documents – this has turned out to be an unscientific road-widening project with catastrophic consequences.
Realising the nuances of Himalayan environment, a mission document released by the ministry of science and technology in June 2010, highlights some caveats under the heading ‘Green Road Construction’. While accepting the fact that roads are the lifeline of remote regions in the mountains’ interiors, it says that construction of roads must fully consider the region’s environmental fragility. Thus, the government ignores its own policy framework that recommends “best practice” norms for infrastructural expansion in mountain regions to minimise the impact on the mountain ecosystems and landscapes.
Touted as an all-weather four-lane link mainly to enable faster motorised movement of the pilgrim tourists to reach the hill shrines, the work is expected to widen the existing mountain road into a 12-metre wide highway. Though it began as a tourism project, it is now being defended in the Supreme Court as a defence-related requirement for moving troops and armaments.
The court, which initially passed an order in 2019 favouring a narrower intermediate road-width for the highways (5.5 m) based on the recommendation of a high-powered expert committee appointed in 2019 and ministry of road transport and highways’ own circular of 2018, is now being approached again with an appeal to view the widening of the hill roads (7.5 m) from a national security angle.
Whatever the considerations, the fundamental issue is the carrying capacity of the system. A widened road constantly blocked by massive landslide or avalanches and slope collapses will end up as a double whammy in that not only the troop or armament movement gets delayed but the massive effort would be required on clearing or reconstructing the damaged road that could happen at a most critical time. This is probably the reason why the late General Bipin Rawat, said that the existing roads are fine with the army as it has the capability of air-lifting the troops and heavy artillery that includes Brahmos missiles, although it is a known fact that such missiles need not be taken to the border areas for the purpose of launching.
While implementing a free-way project in the Himalaya, a major question that stares you down is whether the mountain morphology with steep slopes and sharp gradients is easily amenable to human engineering. This landscape, a product of contrasting forces of tectonism and climate, gets flattened out in the hinterland parts like Ladakh or Tibet for geological reasons. The steep gradients of the Uttarakhand Himalaya make it dynamically heterogeneous, in terms of climatic variables, hydrological processes and biodiversity, at every turn of the mountain path. This has become amply clear from the recent series of disasters in this part, the impact of which was exacerbated by the unsustainable human interferences in the natural systems.
The Himalaya, with its vast green cover is an eco-service provider, is the home of the largest volume of snow and ice outside the polar regions, and the source of some of Asia’s major rivers. A key driver in regulating the Asian climate, it is now in grave danger of losing its original splendour and power as a major climatic regulating force thanks to human-induced climate change and global warming.
India has set forth an ambitious long-term climate policy in the recent COP26 meeting, proclaiming that we will reach net zero carbon emission by 2070. To reach this long-term goal, the country must formulate short-term goals to strengthen the sustainability of ecosystems. The Char Dham project challenges all those well-intentioned aspirations.
CP Rajendran is an adjunct professor at the National Institute of Advanced Studies, Bengaluru and author of a forthcoming book, ‘Earthquakes of the Indian Subcontinent’
