Times of India: Nagpur: Sunday,
February 03, 2013.
Industrialists
and mining lobby maybe raising the bogey of union ministry of environment and
forests (MoEF) as hurting development but the truth is that the expert
appraisal committee (EAC) on river valley and hydroelectric projects (RVPs)
under MoEF has not rejected a single project in the last six years.
According to
an analysis by South Asia Network on Dams, Rivers & People (SANDRAP), a NGO
working to save environment and rivers in the country, EAC considered a total
of 262 hydropower and irrigation projects from April 2007 to December 2012.
Member-secretary
of EAC B B Barman refused to comment saying, "I'm not authorized to talk
to the media. You can talk to the environment minister or secretary."
The newly
constituted EAC on river valley projects is meeting for the first time from
February 1 and 2. "We believe this analysis provides a picture of how EAC
has been functioning for the last six years and also gives an opportunity for
course correction where necessary," said Himanshu Thakkar, convener of
SANDRAP.
The analysis
based on information under RTI and minutes of 63 meetings of earlier EAC shows
it has not rejected a single project so far. In case of two projects that it
declined to recommend clearance, it basically asked the developers to come back
with reformulated proposals.
"It
seems the committee is actually an expert approval committee, since it seems to
have expertise in approving rather than appraising the projects
objectively," Thakkar said.
Far from
being the 'green terror' that industrial lobby loves to portray, the analysis
proves EAC is astoundingly pro-development at the cost of ecology. In less than
six years, EAC recommended terms of reference (TOR) clearance of Stage-I for
hydropower projects proposed with installed capacity of 49,458MW.
It also
recommended final environmental clearance (EC) for hydropower capacity of
16,084MW. EAC gave TOR for 3.28 million hectare of cultivable command area (
CCA) and EC for 1.59 million hectares. SANDRAP says since 1991-92, there has
been no addition to the net area irrigated by major and medium irrigation
projects at national level as per official figures.
"In
light of this fact and considering the overcapacity already built into a number
of basins across India, such clearances by EAC are highly questionable,"
said Parineeta Dandekar, co-convener of SANDRAP in Pune.
SANDRAP said
EAC had shown strong pro-project, anti-environment and anti-people bias. EAC
has refused to make amends in its minutes and refused to review its decisions
even when significant errors have been brought to its notice.
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