Paying the price for ravaging nature

We are all stunned, but not adequately shamed, by the tsunami onslaught and the destruction caused by it along the eastern coast of India. Our press, administration and politicians of all parties are reporting and declaiming on endless issues, except the most fundamental one. The one that, in actual fact, was the reason for the scale of deaths?the blatant violations of our existing laws that were initiated by Indira and piloted through an Act of Parliament by Rajiv Gandhi.

In 1981, Indira Gandhi wrote to the department of environment, which was at the time a part of the ministry of science and technology, that there should be a completely inviolate zone declared 500 metres from the high tide line, across India. If Congressmen and women were to read that letter today, after the tsunami reality, they would have to hang their heads in shame for having turned a blind eye to the violations along the Indian coast.

It was in 1986 that Rajiv Gandhi placed the Environ-ment Protection Bill on the floor of Parliament and it was passed. This is a central Act, with all powers placed in the ministry of environment and forests ,where the central government has to use the state government as its agency for enforcement of the Act.

In 1991, the Coastal Zone Regulation became an intrinsic part of this Central Act. That is the legal position today.

Here is a brief expose of what has been happening from the year 2000, through the offices of the central ministry of environment and forests in Delhi, controlled by a southern ally of the then government. Prior to 2000, there was hardly any tampering of, and tinkering with, the Act. From 2000 to 2003, 21 changes and notifications were made through the ministry in Delhi? changes in the coastal zone regulation. The previous BJP-led government allowed the violation of the Act for commercial purposes, for mining of rare minerals, oil storage, storage of other petroleum products, liquified gas (all inflammable and hugely dangerous at those points), air-strips, etcetera. The atomic energy department was given free use within the inviolate zone, too.

The present UPA government, with the same ally as the earlier government had at the helm of environment and forests at the centre, carries on the same tradition of breaking the law and violating the norms through amendments et al. Tens of thousands of coastal zone violations have accumulated in the ministry of environment and have never been dealt with. It is a shocker. Today, all those men and women who participated in the violations have their hands bloodied by the havoc caused and the deaths that have overwhelmed us.

For the Congress party to ignore their legacy of the protection of this land is unforgivable. And for them to allow their political ally to get away with the murder of Acts of Parliament that the Congress itself has piloted over the years is incomprehensible, and totally unwarranted. It is an abuse of the foresight of both Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi, who genuinely believ-ed in and cared about the habitat, the ruthless protection of which is essential for the safety of us and future generations of Indians.

And to bring the horror closer to home, to the home of corporate India, Mumbai?imagine a tsunami hitting the coast of Maharashtra. There have been massive violations along the Maharashtra coast, even in Mumbai where, I recall, some industrialists were furious with NGOs who were stalling their building activities. They may well live to regret it. One such wave on the west coast and it could be the end of Mumbai. Everyone?s blood will be on everyone?s hands. The worst is not over?brutal assaults on land and sea by man over the last decades will see many more ?regular? disasters hit us all. Time-bombs ticking away. We are finally beginning to pay the price for our rapacious destruction of the land and the sea.

We will also have to take the warnings of environmentalists seriously and not dismiss them as cranks. They have proven their worth. Politicians, administrators and business people who have allowed, endorsed and used the rampant destruction of the environment for their material gain, will soon have to plead guilty to be forgiven for their sins.