The Indian government weakened rules to curb pollution caused by its expanding coal industry after lobbying by top producers, even as it agreed internationally to phase down the use of coal, Climate Home has found.

India’s coal giants pushed back hard against environmental regulation meant to tighten up the disposal of fly ash – a byproduct of coal-fired power plants known to harm both humans and the environment if not managed properly.

Letters sent by coal companies to the Indian government, and accessed by Climate Home News through freedom of information requests to government agencies, reveal lobbying efforts to weaken federal rules between 2019 and 2023 by Coal India Limited (CIL), the world’s third-biggest coal mining company, and National Thermal Power Corporation(NTPC), one of the world’s top 10 coal-fired power companies. Top management at the state–run giants claimed that their organisations would not be able to fully comply with the regulations, which aimed to control fly ash disposal after decades of public health impacts for local communities. Even after the rules were approved, the companies continued efforts to weaken them, in some cases successfully.

The coal companies argued that financial constraints would keep them from meeting the new requirements to clean up waste accumulated over decades and prevent further ash pollution, according to the accessed documents.

In some cases, lobbying got results and regulations were eased, with the environment and power ministries drawing on arguments from both companies in official correspondence between government agencies.

In 2021, while the proposed fly ash mandates were under discussion within India, the country was negotiating the COP26 climate pact in Glasgow, which calls on governments to take action “towards the phase-down of unabated coal power”.

At those UN talks, India was widely reported to have rejected stronger language on a global shift away from coal, but it agreed to scale back unabated coal power, produced without technology to reduce its climate-heating emissions.

Despite this deal, coal infrastructure around the world has since grown, mostly driven by added coal mining and power capacity in India, China and Indonesia.

The Indian documents obtained by Climate Home reveal that the South Asian nation’s coal companies lobbied against regulations on fly ash pollution while expanding coal production at record speed.

In their correspondence with ministries, they said high fines for non-compliance with waste disposal rules were a risk to their financial sustainability and raised the prospect of coal-fired power plants being shut down, triggering a power crisis in the country.

Fly Ash Pollution

When thermal power plants burn coal for energy, the fly ash they generate as a byproduct is dumped in water-filled dam-like structures called dykes.

Old “legacy” dykes store ash from previous decades and are a major source of pollution for nearby communities, explained independent air pollution analyst Sunil Dahiya. Wet ash can leach into groundwater, while dry ash can blow away, causing air pollution and damaging crops.

Functioning disposal sites are also vulnerable to heavy rains, as they can overflow and pollute nearby settlements. This happened on at least three occasions between 2019 and 2021, according to a 2021 report by the NGO Fly Ash Watch Group.

To minimise the impacts of fly ash, companies can recycle it into products like bricks, cement sheets, panels and other construction materials – a process known as “utilisation”.

Sehr Raheja, climate change officer at the Indian think-tank Centre for Science and Environment (CSE), highlighted the need to utilise “legacy” ash given “the enormous quantity”, adding there are risks involved with it staying underground, such as water and soil pollution. As of 2019, the amount of accumulated unused ash in the country was about 1.65 bntonnes, according to a CSE report, with newer estimates suggesting even more, she said.

Controlling Pollution

Fly ash regulation – known officially as the Fly Ash Notification – has existed in India since 1999, but it was not until a 2021 update to the rules that fines were introduced for failing to comply with proper waste disposal, following the ‘polluter pays’ principle.

The regulation also imposed a mandate on thermal power plants to ensure 100% utilisation of accumulated old fly ash, as well as fresh ash produced by ongoing operations.

Documents accessed by Climate Home show that NTPC exchanged letters with government agencies asking for elimination of the mandate to clean up accumulated ash.

“It is proposed that the provisions for utilization of old legacy ash may be dropped,” reads a 2021 letter from NTPC to the Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change.

The 2021 rules were nonetheless passed, and they did introduce strict fines for coal companies. However, they also included what experts called a “loophole”.

The fly ash regulation exempted power plants from having to find a use for their old legacy ash as long as the ponds where it was stored were considered “stabilised”, meaning they had been secured against leakage. But the technical specifications of how that should be done were not defined, leading to concerns that arbitrary exemptions could be granted.

Yet even after these revamped regulations came into force in late 2021, lobbying intensified.

Persistent Lobbying

In 2022, NTPC was still concerned by a deadline of 10 years to utilise all legacy ash accumulated over decades, according to a letter addressed to the environment ministry. This would force them to transfer large quantities of fly ash to end users like brick-making kilns or ceramic product makers — or pay fines.

NTPC met with regulators at the Ministry of Power and agreed an extension to the period for stabilising old ash dykes from one to three years.

In the case of “operational” ponds, officials were persuaded not to label them as legacy ash, exempting them for the requirement for full utilisation. These changes were included in a 2022 amendment to the rules.

Shripad Dharmadhikary, who leads a civil society research group Manthan Adhyayan Kendra and has worked on fly ash management, said the unclear definition of stabilisation and longer timeframe for doing it provide “a loophole for power plants to evade use or proper disposal of legacy ash”.

The lack of technical parameters meant government authorities could struggle to guarantee that no more leaks would occur even if they certified the ponds, he added.

“Threat” to coal finances

The powerful companies also managed to limit the level of fines for non-compliance in a prolonged effort that began in 2020, when the first draft proposal on the new fly ash rules was circulated among coal companies.

That included a fine of Rs 1500 per ton, which was cut to Rs 1000 in the final 2021 rules after NTPC and other coal companies opposed it and asked for it to be removed entirely.

Even after this, executives from both Coal India and NTPC expressed alarm about the financial implications of the fines.

In a February 2022 letter to the Ministry of Environment, for instance, NTPC’s then director of operations Ramesh Babu V. wrote that the company could end up paying Rs 76,000 crores ($9 billion) over a decade – an amount “significant enough to threaten financial viability of NTPC and country’s thermal sector alike”. He warned the penalties could make large power stations at mining pit heads commercially unviable, leading to a “power crisis”.

Similarly, in a 2023 letter, CIL chairman and managing director Pramod Agrawal estimated that the “financial penalty” on only one of its subsidiaries (NCL) for failure to comply with the regulations could cost the latter Rs 38,145 crores (at least $4 billion) for just the 2022- 2023 financial year.

Coal expansion

However, the threats the executives outlined to the companies’ bottom lines do not seem to have translated into lower capacity to mine coal and produce thermal power, with both ramped up drastically during and after discussions on the Fly Ash Notification.

Expansion efforts were redoubled especially after an unprecedented power crisis in late 2021, which was attributed to logistical issues causing a shortage of coal supply.

In a January 2024 conference call with investors, NTPC’s management said it was considering awarding thermal power capacity of 15.2 GW in the near future, on top of the 9.6 GW thermal capacity already under construction for the group.

CIL, in its latest annual report, announced plans to increase coal mining capacity to 1 billion tonnes by the financial year 2025-26.

A previous investigation by Climate Home News showed that European asset managers had invested substantially in both NTPC and CIL, helping India’s coal industry to expand rather than phase down in line with international commitments.

Air pollution expert Dahiya said that, while India has lower historical emissions than countries in the Global North and requires flexibility to meet its energy needs, as well as international support to move away from fossil fuels, that did not mean coal companies should be “free to pollute”.

Raheja, of the CSE, said better controls on pollution are also a matter of justice for those living near coal-fired power plants.

“The environmental regulations are critically important for maintaining the health of the environment and of communities residing near coal facilities – even of people far away – as pollution, both through air and water, can be carried to a distance,” Raheja told Climate Home News.

This article was first published on The AIDEM

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Koli women of the Diva Gaon fish market continue to face trying days after hundreds of fish surfaced dead in the community’s holding ponds mid-October, 2021. Areas that yielded entire batches of grey mullet, Asian sea bass and crabs have become uninhabitable due to worsening conditions of Thane creek, said fisherfolk.

Members of Airoli’s Koli community earned Rs. 15,000 to Rs. 20,000 monthly by selling big and small fish and crustaceans harvested from their ponds in Diva Gaothan. However, years of accumulating silt has become a stumbling block for their livelihood. According to Diva Koliwada Machhimaar Seva Sanstha Chairman Chandan Madhvi the mass fish deaths around October 15 were the direct result of the lack of desiltation in the ponds.

“The growing silt deposit is creating mudflats and rotting the black mangrove trees. These die and fall into the pond where the fish eat the toxic items. We have been asking for the desiltation of these ponds for a long time,” Madhvi told SabrangIndia.

The delay in cleaning these plants has cost many fisherfolk. Fisherman Gulab Patil said he lost as many as 200 fish. Authorities, who visited his pond near the Coastal and Marine Biodiversity Centre, promised to clean the area. But even after two weeks, Patil says he is still waiting.

Still, desiltation work is likely to take around five to six months. During this time, fisherfolk will have no choice but to row all the way to Vashi bridge to catch fish from now on. Madhvi said this will create conflict among the fishers in the region.

Earlier, small crabs from the pond sold for around Rs. 500 while big crabs went for Rs. 1,000 to Rs. 2,000. Add this to the sale of the aforementioned big fish, and fisherfolk managed to break even after paying for fishing equipment, fuel and stall rent.

Fisherwoman Jaymala Madhvi recalled that she would earn up to Rs. 20,000 before October by only selling crabs. Recently she struggled to earn Rs. 5,000. Madhvi estimated that at least 400 crabs must have died during the incident.

When asked whether Chairman Madhvi has any hope of authorities compensating fishers for their loss he said, “Koli folk have not received any disaster compensation so far. Why don’t we? We are suffering due to polluted water and dying mangroves. At least help us remove the dead trees.”

In response, Airoli-Diva Forest Range Officer (FRO) N. G. Pokhale told SabrangIndia that desilting the area has become complicated since the mangrove area was recognised as forest land under Section 20 of the Indian Forest Act. “We are trying to form a committee to check the water quality in the ponds and address the concerns of the community. We also had a meeting around September with community members, but it is unclear exactly when desilting will begin,” said Pokhale.

As the region lies within an eco-sensitive zone (ESZ), the move also requires the permission of the Bombay High Court after the committee assesses its impact on the mangroves and mudflat ecosystem.

Industrial waste a bigger issue than desilting

Tracing the issue further back, Vanashakti NGO Director D. Stalin squarely blamed the steady flow of pollutants in Thane creek for the fish deaths.

“Increased sewage in the creek has lowered oxygen levels in the water and killed fish. From Thane to Dombivali, there are companies releasing their waste in the water. So long as these pollutants continue, desiltation will be required,” Stalin told SabrangIndia.

According to the Thane Creek Flamingo Sanctuary Management Plan 2020 report, there are two sewage treatment plants (STPs) on either side of the sanctuary. Stalin said that only the Bhandup STP works at half its capacity. He condemned the “insensitive” state and city administrations for failing to improve the creek conditions. Further, he worried about the amendment proposal for the Forest (Conservation) Act, 1980 (FCA) that diluted the requirement for environmental clearance. “The amendments will make it easier to divert forests,” he said.

Earlier, the FCA stated that the Principal Chief Conservator of the concerned forest area will grant permission for tree felling or similar projects on the recommendation of the Divisional Forest Officer (in the absence of a competent authority). If the proposed amendments are accepted, reserved forest land may be given to private organisations without requiring environmental clearance.

Fish deaths a recurring horror

While the mass fish deaths this month disconcerted fishers, baseline studies in 2016 said that it is not a new occurrence for Thane Creek. Survey personnel found mass fish deaths of the same grey mullet fish and, like Stalin, blamed the effluents from the industrial belt situated on the East bank. The Thane-Belapur area is known as one of Asia’s largest industrialised zones. The waste released by such an urban region far exceeds the assimilating capacity of the creek, said the report. As the problem remains neglected, the negative impact continues to worsen at a larger scale.

Left with no other choice, Airoli fisherfolk wait for Ekadashi when the high tide will bring in fresh water and sustenance. On October 27 they held final rites for the dead fish to make a final appeal to Gods.

Related:

Forest Conservation Act: GoI suggests fundamental changes Act, despite widespread objections
Mumbai’s Koli folk decry coastal road project
Maharashtra’s fishing community fights to protect its ‘golden belt’ coast

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The Gujarat High Court has directed the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation (AMC) to identify and disconnect, at the earliest, the unauthorised industrial wastewater connections to the CETP mega pipeline that disposes treated waste into the Sabarmati river.

In an interim order, Justices J. B. Pardiwala and Vaibhav D. Nanavati gave a slew of instructions to the AMC, after a Joint Task Force (JTF) report revealed the dismal functioning of the Sewage Treatment Plants (STPs). The report said that the STPs were never properly reviewed or evaluated and systematic problems were left unquestioned. It even stated that the AMC has no record of operational status and issues.

“The need of generation of authentic data of sewage/ wastewater generation, disposal and characterization itself shows the lack of institutional coordination and functional mechanism… stakeholders like STP operators, AMC and GPCB are working in a fragmented manner with lack of coordination,” found the report. The team said that a huge volume of data was generated from the SCADA system, online analyzers and laboratory analysis but remained unverified and unused for corrective measures. Therefore, it called the STPs malfunction a “systemic” rather than technical issue and called for more frequent and rigorous review of the plants.

Based on these and more findings, the Court called for immediate identification of the unauthorised sewage connections. Further, it requested the AMC Commissioner and State Chief Secretary to work together to ensure the Court’s directions are complied with in letter and spirit. It also requested the Chief Secretary to keep a close watch on the present public interest litigation and extend full cooperation.

“We lay much stress on this particular direction [because] if we want to achieve good and positive results, then such identification is a must and it should be undertaken at the earliest. We direct that the identification and disconnection of all such unauthorized connections shall be done by the owner of the respective pipeline network. The actions and the outcome shall be shared among stakeholders from time to time,” said the court.

It directed the AMC to explore possible means to treat the sewage in the carrying drains until arrangements for sewerage system and STPs are ensured. Similarly, the AMC will consider the provision of neutralisation of wastewater received at STPs to prevent the disturbance of the biological treatment system of the STP.

“This would also protect the river as well as the plant machinery. This provision would be preventive. The identification and check on the unauthorised acidic effluent discharge shall be ensured through coordinated surveillance,” observed the Court.

Acknowledging the shortcomings of laboratories as mentioned in the JTF report, the Court directed the administration to look into the affairs of the laboratories in all respects. The Court said that laboratories are not functioning in the manner expected by the law for such labs, and that it is the Gujarat Pollution Control Board’s (GPCB) duty to keep a close watch on the labs because it relied on their furnished data.

“If there are inefficient or unqualified people or technicians in the laboratories, then the contract should be immediately terminated… and fresh appointments shall be made of qualified and efficient staff,” said the court order.

Accordingly, the court directed the AMC to regularly verify and strengthen continuous online analysers for data reliability and provide the JTF with the necessary details of hot spot zones identified on the basis of the PH monitoring at all pumping stations. Moreover, all Common Effluent Treatment Plants (CETPs) shall ensure operational Online Monitoring of Industrial Emission & Effluent (OCEMS) with connectivity with the GPCB portal. CETPs shall list out technical reasons for non-compliance.

Related:

Gujarat’s environmental group demands cancellation of GPCL’s environmental clearance
Vadodara’s industries continue to pollute river and groundwater with impunity
Environmentalist decries continuous pollution of Daman Ganga river by Vapi industries
NGT imposes 25 crore interim penalty in Dahej chemical factory blast incident: Gujarat

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Vadodara Industrial Cluster which has about 300 industries is allegedly dumping effluents into Gujarat’s pristine rivers. Activists have shared evidence of such pollution for decades, but industries still have the gall to allegedly ask pollution control boards to go soft on them as they’re struggling during the lockdown!

Independent People’s Tribunal’s findings in 1999

In February 1999, The Indian People’s Tribunal on Environment and Human Rights headed by Late Justice Hosbet Suresh was launched to understand the spread and ramifications of industrialization and pollution in the ‘Golden Corridor’ of Gujarat. The inquiry was held in response to the requests from Paryavaran Suraksha Samiti, Vadodara Kamdar Union, Vyavasahik Swastha Swaksha Mandal and other concerned individuals and organisations active in the area. The panel of experts included environmental lawyers, health specialists and occupational health specialists and scientists.

The tribunal had studied the Effluent Channel Project (ECP) which commenced in 1983. The 55.6 kms long closed masonry conduit passes through agricultural lands in 24 villages in Vadodara and Bharuch districts. We were informed that initially only 13 industries discharged their effluents through the Channel, but now at least 150 industries are members of the ECP. The ECP meets Gulf of Cambay at Sarod village in Bharuch District, at J Point where the effluent is discharged into the estuary.

While in 1999 the number of industries was found to be 150, environmentalists say that now there are at least 300 industries dumping waste water into the ECP. A thesis conducted by Mr. Avnesh Sharma titled “Environment Impact Assessment Along the Effluent Channel from Baroda to Jambusar and At its Confluence with Mahi Estuary at the Gulf of Cambay with Special Reference to Heavy Metals” had pointed out increasing heavy metal contamination –

 “The total solids was quite high with the value of nearly 2000 mg. per liter at J Point and it was hardly 200 gms per liter upstream of J Point. There was an overall increase of 34 % between 1991 and 1993. Correspondingly, both dissolved solids and suspended solids have also registered an increase.  This is reflected in the increasing concentration of these parameters upstream. A matter of concern is the dissolved oxygen content at the J Point which in the span of 3 year study period has shown a decrease from a maximum of 7 mg per liter to 6.1 mg per liter in 1993. Correspondingly the COD value has increased by 12%. Disconcertingly, the COD and BOD values in the upstream area in turn have increased 100 and 332% respectively.”

The thesis also pointed out at an increase in the concentration of chlorides, sulfates and nitrates apart from a disturbing trend in the increasing concentrations of cyanide, oil grease and phenols at the three points of the study from 1991 to 1993. The study also found metal contamination of the soil from an area irrigated by the ECP effluent water and possible seepage of water and contaminants into the underground aquifers over the years.

Not only this, the tribunal had also found that the people along the ‘Golden Corridor’ complained of asthma, cancer, infertility and related problems, corrosion of fingers, toes and perforation of the nasal septum (wall separating the nostrils), skin irritation and other health problems.

Soon after the news of the tribunal’s examination to be held at the site, the Chief Executive of the ECP had replied that values of the metal were “well below the standards”, denied that there was seepage of the ECP effluent into tube wells and that the effluent was safe enough to be mixed with the sea and didn’t harm aquatic life. What was more appalling was that he said that there were “elaborate arrangements” for proper dispersion of the out fall of the ECP and elaborate arrangements “gun men, guards, notices and hoarding not to use the ECP effluent for agriculture”. He had also stated that “some farmers may be using channel effluent not only because they may not have a source of fresh water supply but because of the temptation to use the channel water which is free of cost and is not found to damage the crops.

The findings of the tribunal on the ECP case were that the ECP project was found to be ill-conceived. The tribunal pointed out that if the idea of the ECP was to transport highly polluted effluent into the sea to save the villages from its deleterious effect, even that purpose wasn’t fully served as there was heavy metal contamination found in the soil and vegetation around the channel. The tribunal had recommended that the ECP construct an underground closed pipeline to carry the effluents so as to minimize the risk of farmers using the effluent for irrigation of unauthorized entities dumping into the channel.

From 1999 – 2020

From 1999 until now, environmentalists have been communicating the issues of non-compliance of the ECP by Vadodara Enviro Channel Limited, but even then there has been no definitive action taken against them.

In latest reports, the members of the Paryavaran Suraksha Samiti (PSS) in 2018, along with the Gujarat Pollution Control Board and Farmers Action Group had undertaken a joint investigation into the status of groundwater in Vadodara’s Padra Taluka and found that the Chemical Oxygen Demand at the Huntsman International India (P) Ltd found that the Chemical Oxygen Demand (COD) levels were 2225 in Abstraction Well 1 and 2959 in Well 2 inside the factory premises.

In a sample collected on October 12, 2019 Prajapati had told The Times of India that the Chemical Oxygen Demand was 1214 mg/l instead of the permissible 250 mg/l. In a sample taken on September 6, 2019, the COD at J Point was 1976 mg/l. On August 13, 2019, the COD was 1078 mg/l.

On June 1, 2020, the PSS had again written to top officials regarding the shocking violations at the J point. A consistent study of the wastewater discharged shows that prescribed norms have continuously been violated. According to the latest samples taken in May 2020, the Chemical Oxygen Demand (COD) at ‘J Point’ is 1065 mg/l (Norm: 250 mg/l), Chloride 7497 mg/l (Norms 600 mg/l), Sulfate 1473 mg/l (Norms 100 mg/l), and Ammoniacal Nitrogen (NH3-N) 232.96 mg/l (Norms 50 mg/l).

Recent videos of the river being polluted may be viewed below.

PLEASE EMBED VIDEO HERE

(Video Courtesy – Rohit Prajapati)

The environmentalists had said given the contamination of the ground water, it could be said that the officials of the government officials had failed in their duties and responsibilities to act against the polluting industries. The environmentalists had called for a criminal case against all the industries around ECP demanding exemplary action and a criminal case against the Chief Secretary, the Additional Chief Secretary of Forest and Environment Department of Gujarat State, the Chairman of GPCB, the Collector(s) of Vadodara District who are and were holding the post from 2000 – 2019, for their failing in their duty, in spite of repeated complaints, in preventing the contamination of groundwater at irreversible level.

After continued complaints by the PSS on December 13 2018, the Gujarat Pollution Control Board (GPCB) had issued VECL a closure notice for not complying with water quality norms and stated that if corrective measures were not taken by VECL within 30 days, it would be forced to implement closure. VECL had then moved the Gujarat High court against this notice. However, even after all these efforts by PSS and the orders by the NGT and Supreme Court, VECL was given four extensions by the GPCB even though the CC&A license had expired. GPCB cited that the extensions were given on the basis of reports saying they were trying to address the issue, DNA had reported.

In 2018, the PSS had asked for ad-hoc Exemplary Monetary Compensation along with medical services to the farmers and villagers who have suffered from groundwater pollution. This should collectively be decided by CPCB, GPCB, affected farmers, and the representatives of the Voluntary Organisation working in this area on the basis of monthly instalments per contaminated well until decontamination of well is done by way of short-term and long-term remedial measures, including but not limited to technically and scientifically sound holistic nature restoration of polluted and damaged land and water areas based on the “Polluter Pays Principle”.

However, even after repeated attempts, there has been no response of concerned authorities with regards to the setting up of “common effluent treatment plants” and “sewage treatment plants” as directed by the Supreme Court (No. 375 of 2012) or to take up in-situ remediation of sewage as directed by the National Green Tribunal (No. 673 of 2018). Not only this, the PSS said that when it approached a city Corporation and a Municipality to work out the detailed plan for investigation, improvement of the existing STPs, discontinuation of the untreated Sewage into Rivers and water bodies, it didn’t receive an adequate or satisfactory response from these authorities.

Through the years, the PSS and other organizations have not only brought evidence to support their claims of river and ground water pollution, but have also handed on a platter, to authorities, remediation measures to control the repercussions. However, even then the authorities continue to turn a blind eye to such well thought-out and researched measures, thus allowing polluting industries to escape from the clutches of the law.

Now the new draft Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) 2020 proposed by the Union government is another step ensured at neglecting the much needed balance between development and environmental protection, by allowing post-facto clearance, expanding the list of projects exempted from public consultation, extending the validity period of clearance granted to mining projects and decreasing the monitoring requirement thus reducing accountability. The authorities have always turned a blind eye towards the indigenous people of the land who depend on nature for their lives and livelihood. As industrial disasters continue to spurt, the inaction of the government combined with the draft EIA 2020 is only going to further rob people of their lands and ruin the last of nature that we have left.

Related:

VECL consistently flouting environmental laws: Paryavaran Suraksha Samiti

Environmentalist decries continuous pollution of Daman Ganga river by Vapi industries

GPCB’s casual reply to action sought in view of dangerously very high COD level in groundwater

New sample suggests high pollution off Vadodara effluent channel, ‘requires’ action

The post Vadodara’s industries continue to pollute river and groundwater with impunity appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The Minister said, “The Centre had identified 200 cities and told the civic corporations there that we would give the money for the creation of urban forests.”

Javadekar has been in support of this set-off strategy since at least 2016, when the Environment Ministry undertook the Urban Forestry Scheme to create an ‘urban jungle’ in Pune on about 80 acres of land. He said, “There is a need for urban forests. We need to plant trees. We have done that in Pune where the forest is spread over 70 acres. Today, many people walk to the place every day. That would be a big tourist attraction in coming days.”

In the press information release for that scheme, Javadekar explained the need for the urban forestry program by stating that most of our cities have gardens and parks but no forests, and that even where the forest department has its land, there is only degraded forestry or no forest at all. Javadekar reportedly stated in the Parliament, “Seven trees give oxygen for one person’s lifetime. … We have to make it a people’s movement. It is the responsibility of everyone. If human actions have damaged the earth then human actions will improve it.” This is rather ironic given how it is the BJP that has been at the forefront of undertaking ‘development’ projects that require the sacrifice of forests.

Take the case of the Aarey forest in Mumbai where 2,700 trees were chopped despite citizens’ protests, to make way for the Mumbai Metro Rail Corporation’s car shed. Also, nearly 54,000 mangroves were set to be cut for the Mumbai Ahmedabad bullet train. BJP MLA and former mayor of Mira-Bhayandar municipality Narendra Mehta was reported to have cut down 35 acres in the area to build a posh club!

Meanwhile, Javadekar expressed confidence that the government would find a lasting solution to the pollution problem within the next 15 years. Additionally, he listed out steps that the government has taken to control pollution created by construction sites, emissions from vehicles, and disposal of waste.

As to the deteriorating air quality in Delhi, he said that there has been successive improvement in the quality in from January-November 19 from 2016.  He claimed that “good” and “moderate” air quality days in the national capital had improved over the past three years.

Related:

Salt pans, mangroves to go as Centre plans expansion: Mumbai’s Degradation

Aarey Adivasis seek forgiveness from felled trees

Ban on tree felling to continue in Aarey: SC

The post Env Min pitches ‘Urban Forest’ to counter pollution appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Image Courtesy: nationalheraldindia.com

In what was another instance of the ruling party members engaging in hate speech, BJP leader Kapil Mishra found himself at the end of the wrath of the public over a controversial tweet for stoking communal hatred.

“If you want pollution to come down, then you should reduce these firecrackers and not the ones burst on Diwali,” Mishra tweeted tagging a photograph of an elderly man with a skull cap and several children along with women in burqa, waiting in a queue.

The tweet was soon taken down by Twitter for violating its guidelines.

Mahmood Ahmed, a resident of Joga Bai Extension filed the complaint against BJP leader at the Jamia Nagar Police Station requesting to register an FIR under relvant sections of Information Technology Act and the Indian penal Code. Mahmood alleged that Mishra’s tweet allegedly sought to create enmity, hatered and communal violence.

Activist Saket Gokhale also filed an FIR against Mishra at the Bhajan Pura police station in Delhi citing for provocative communal hate speech against minorities.

“This is to bring to your notice that Mr Kapil Mishra, a Bharatiya Janata Party leader from Delhi, has on 28 October 2019 made inflammatory comments targeting the Muslim community through his Twitter handle: @KapilMishra_IND,” the complaint read.

“This content is inflammatory, unacceptable and seeks to create enmity, hatred and communal violence. It is demeaning, degrading and obscene, will corrupt minds and seriously affect religious sentiments. It may lead to illogical and dangerous consequences,” it said.

Mishra, however, maintained that he was only trying to raise awareness on the need for population control.

Twitter war

Soon after Mishra’s tweet, several individuals condemned his idea. The Rashtriya Janata Dal (JDU) criticized his tweet stating that he compared ‘Muslim children to pollution’ for his ‘petty politics’.

To this Mishra replied saying that there was no mention of Hindu or Muslim in his tweet and questioned that if the photo was of a non-Muslim family, would the RJD still take up the matter?

In no time, the right-wing fanatic army soon erupted in support of Mishra with the #IStandWithKapilMishra.

Kapil Mishra later tweeted saying he had even started getting personal calls abusing and threatening him over his tweet.

And showing no remorse for what he had implied, he instead threatened by asking all those who pulled him up for his vile remark, “There is so much fear after one tweet? What will these people do when the population control law comes in place?”

Not the first BJP leader to indulge in communal hate speech

It is a documented fact that under the Modi government, hateful and divisive language by politicians in high posts in the party, has increased almost 500% in the past four years.

Just this month, Gajraj Rana, the BJP’s city president for Deoband ‘advised’ people to buy iron swords on Dhanteras and not gold ornaments and silverware. His comments came soon after the Supreme Court finished hearings in the Ayodha land dispute case.

Again, this month, the Election Commission pulled up BJP Mumbai Chief Mangal Prabhat Lodha for his communal speech at a rally in support of a candidate. He referred to previous instances of terror attacks and riots, claiming that claiming that bombs and bullets were manufactured ‘in lanes within 5 km’ of the meeting venue – one that held a sizeable Muslim population.

In another instance, BJP leader Rajeshwar Singh boasted of the ruling party’s intent to “ethnically cleanse” 200 million Muslims and 28 million Christians.

Right-wing affiliate Bajrang Dal asked organisers to check Aadhaar cards of men at garba celebrations and also to not employ non-Hindus as bouncers at the events.

BJP MP Sakshi Maharaj has previously strongly associated terrorism with madarsas and Muslims.

Even Union Minister Amit Shah and PM Modi himself have engaged in hate speech against minorities time and again.

In multiple speeches Shah, among other things, described Muslims as those who “violate our women…who rape our sisters and daughters”. The Election Commission conceded that Shah’s code violations were made with “deliberate and malicious intention”.

Modi has already called the Opposition the “tukde-tukde gang”– literally, the “pieces gang” – to suggest they were out to break up India, and said they speak the language of terrorists.

In all the Centre’s claims of building a ‘New India’, its actions time and again point out to its regressive thought process only aimed at Hinduising the nation.

Their language of violence and openly inciting hatred only go to starkly showcase the party’s political goals.

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EC pulls up BJP Mumbai chief Mangal Prabhat Lodha for communal speech at election rally, issues show-cause notice
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Justified? Caste slur ‘ONLY’ if made in public, in front of a public witness an offense: Bombay HC

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Air quality plummets every year at the onset of the winter in northern India, and stubble burning in the farm states of Punjab, Haryana and western Uttar Pradesh is estimated to account for 20-30% of Delhi’s fine particulate pollution (PM 2.5).

The ‘Odd-Even’ rule (that allows odd- and even-numbered vehicles on the road on alternate days) will come into force from November 4, 2019, for about two weeks. Delhi government is also considering staggered office hours to reduce traffic congestion.

Meanwhile, the Punjab government has asked the Centre for financial help to offer farmers an incentive of Rs 100 per quintal for not burning crop residue.

Due to the short window between the harvesting of paddy and the sowing of wheat, farmers clear their fields for sowing by setting fire to the leftover post-harvest paddy straw.

This process of stubble burning in the farm states of Punjab, Haryana and western Uttar Pradesh accounts for 20-30% of Delhi’s fine particulate pollution (PM 2.5), according to two separate estimates–a 2016 study from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur (IIT Kanpur); and a 2018 study by a Delhi-based think-tank, The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI).

PM 2.5 is a pollutant about 30 times finer than a human hair. It can be inhaled deep into the lungs, and can cause heart attacks, strokes, lung cancer and respiratory diseases. The extent of PM 2.5 pollution is considered the best indicator of health risks from air pollution, according to the World Health Organization.

The current stubble-burning incidents will not have much effect on Delhi’s air due to climatic conditions, Kuldeep Shrivastava, senior scientist at the India Meteorology Department (IMD) in Delhi, told IndiaSpend. The situation will change in the second half of October.
“Due to heavy Easterly winds entering Delhi from Central Uttar Pradesh region and moving towards Punjab and Haryana, all the pollutants from current stubble burning are being pushed into the Pakistan side,” Shrivastava said, adding that for the next 10-15 days stubble burning will not have much effect on Delhi’s air.

“But towards the end of October, wind patterns change into north-westerly, meaning air enters Delhi from Punjab and Haryana, carrying the pollution of stubble burning,” Shrivastava said, “And because at this time of the year winds are lighter and there is no rainfall activity, the pollution does not disperse.” 

Fires caused mostly by burning of early basmati varieties
The recent fire incidents have been spotted in Amritsar and Tarn Taran districts of Punjab which predominantly grow early basmati varieties (varieties that are harvested earlier than the common type), as per a tweet by the Council on Energy, Environment and Water (CEEW), a Delhi-based think tank, on September 26, 2019.

The most number of fire counts in a day, about 99, were spotted on September 24, 2019. CEEW has been tracking the fires through satellite imagery.

Usually the activity of stubble burning picks up in October and goes on until November. During these two months in 2018, Punjab alone recorded more than 50,000 stubble-burning cases, according to this March 2019 study by CEEW.

Stubble Burning In Punjab During Oct-Nov

Source: CEEW

In 2018, there were more than 108,000 stubble burning incidents in Haryana, Punjab and Uttar Pradesh. This was a 47% decline compared to 2016, The Print reported on September 9, 2019, using data from different sources. These states burn about 20 million tonnes of paddy straw in October and November each year–about 2 million truckloads of paddy straw at 10 tonnes per truck.

The governments of Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh, in coordination with the central government and the Indian Council of Agriculture Research (ICAR), have been trying to reduce the number of such cases by 70% in 2019.

Measures include: Promotion of Super Straw Management System (Super SMS), an attachment compatible with any combine harvester which ensures that straws are cut and spread evenly on the field; promotion of a machine called Happy Seeder which helps in sowing wheat crop without the need of moving the straw spread by SMS; establishment of custom hiring centres (CHC) from where farmers can rent such machines.

Under a centrally sponsored 2018 scheme, the ‘Agricultural Mechanisation for in-situ Management of Crop Residues’, the central government has approved a budget of Rs 1,151.80 crore for 2018-19 and 2019-20 for the promotion of Super SMS and Happy Seeder in Haryana, Punjab and Uttar Pradesh, according to this August 2019 government release.

Under the scheme, individual buyers get 50% subsidy and farmers’ cooperatives, self-help groups, registered societies and other entrepreneurs looking to set up a CHC get 80% subsidy.

However, CEEW’s 2019 study noted, even after the scheme farmers continued to burn residue in the wheat harvest season in 2018, just as they seem to be doing again at paddy harvest time now.

However, Trilochan Mohapatra, director general of ICAR, is optimistic that the number of crop burning cases will fall substantially this year.
“This year Haryana is likely to be free from stubble burning. But Punjab and Uttar Pradesh will not be completely free. There has been vast improvement after our intervention,” Mohapatra told The Economic Times in an August 2019 interview. “Chief secretaries and secretaries of concerned departments along with ICAR officials review the situation every month and take corrective action. The pollution index will improve substantially this time,” he added.

After studying the ground realities and how the farmers are reacting to the mechanisation scheme, the CEEW study makes the following suggestions:

Make paddy residue management technologies available with fixed rentals: The Happy Seeder technology coupled with Super SMS-mounted combine harvesters are an innovative and potentially scalable solution to manage paddy residue. To widen use, a careful assessment is needed of farm-level constraints to scaling up, of trade-offs, and of viable business models. However, it is important to fix a uniform rental rate to improve the efficiency of usage and even pricing; app-based rental models could be promoted.

Promote short-duration rice varieties: Punjab Agricultural University has developed early-maturing varieties of rice, such as PR 126 and PR 127. The PR 126 matures in about 123-125 days after seeding and PR 127 in about 137 days. Both the varieties yield around 30 quintals per acre and consume less water than late maturing PUSA varieties that require more water and also leave heavier stubble. A shift to early-maturing rice varieties will allow farmers more time for clearing and preparing fields for sowing wheat. These varieties have a higher yield, consume less water, and resist diseases better; therefore, they can prove more profitable.

Raise farmer awareness: Misperceptions of practices or of cost of alternative technologies of residue removal and other in situ practices seriously constrain uptake. Better residue management practices need to be demonstrated through more, better awareness campaigns and design information tools.

Give farmers incentives to move away from the rice-wheat cultivation cycle: In the long term, Punjab needs to shift away from rice-wheat rotation. Current price signals and marketing and procurement policies of crops other than paddy do not offer farmers at-par incentives to shift away from paddy cultivation. Even if MSPs are announced (for pulses, for example), procurement is still an issue. In choosing between the labour and mechanisation options of managing straw, farmers prefer cash incentives to subsidies.

Set up mechanisms to collect paddy residue: Enterprises such as paper plants can recycle paddy residue; but, to run economically, a plant needs residue from 60-70 acres of land daily, along with six months of storage infrastructure. Currently, there is no uniform mechanism to collect, store, or transport paddy residue; since supply is not assured, industry lacks an incentive to invest in additional plants. Assigning economic value to the residue and recycling it should incentivise the building of this mechanism.

(Tripathi is an IndiaSpend reporting fellow.)

Courtesy: India Spend

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Diagnosed with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease in 2008, former consultant Raj Iyer, 69, has seen his once-itinerant life shrink to his bedroom in eastern Bengaluru, where he lives amidst his life-support equipment, including a 24-hour oxygen supply.

His itinerant, fulfilling life changed 11 years ago when he repeatedly felt short of breath and was eventually diagnosed with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), which had debilitated his lungs and his ability to breathe.

Smoking 60 cigarettes a day for 40 years was probably the immediate cause, although worsening air pollution may have played a role. “I knew my symptoms were of a respiratory disease but I didn’t know it was COPD,” said Iyer. “I certainly didn’t know how bad it gets or that it is incurable.”

Today, Iyer is 69, and his once expansive life has shrunk to a room in his house in Bengaluru’s eastern Pai Layout, where he lives with his primary caregivers, his 34-year-old son and 27-year-old daughter-in-law, whose lives, as we explain later, are circumscribed by his illness.

“When I first got married (in 2012), his COPD was not as bad, and he didn’t need continuous oxygen support,” said Antara Karthikeyan, Iyer’s daughter-in-law and a kindergarten teacher.

As the COPD progressed, Iyer needed oxygen support, multiple hospitalisations because of breathlessness caused by high levels of carbon dioxide–which is toxic to the body and accumulates when COPD affects ability of the lungs to expel carbon dioxide–and fell frequently due to his weakening bones.

Iyer’s room is taken over by the paraphernalia of his life-support system. A “BiPAP machine”, which is a respirator that steadies his breathing. A portable oxygen concentrator to take along while travelling. A larger oxygen concentrator, a machine that scrubs nitrogen from the air and give him a stream of pure oxygen through a 7-m-long plastic tube that allows him to move around the house. And to keep the life-giving gas flowing even when the electricity cuts out in India’s IT capital, notorious for its shaky power grid, the oxygen concentrator is connected to an inverter.
If Iyer’s professional and personal life followed India’s physical and economic transformation, so did the trajectory of the little-known, ill-managed disease that ravages his body–and is killing more Indians than ever before in a country with growing air pollution, more smoking among young people and an ageing, vulnerable population.

An incurable and progressive disease, COPD moved up from eighth spot to second on the list of leading ways to die in India, over 26 years to 2016 (the year for which the latest data are available). COPD claimed more victims than either road accidents or suicides in 2016. It claimed more lives than diabetes, malaria, tuberculosis and breast cancer combined in 2016. It only trails heart disease in the number of Indians it kills.
COPD is responsible for nearly a million deaths every year, as IndiaSpend reported in March 2019, in the first part of this series. The second part explained the contribution of traditional stoves burning coal, wood and cow-dung to COPD in India. In this, the third part, we bring you the story of a nation’s toxic air, a dangerous habit and a man being slowly claimed by a disease killing more Indians than ever before.

The fourth part will explain how India is unprepared for its COPD crisis.

Air pollution, smoking and ageing

Tobacco smoking is the primary cause of COPD worldwide, and it is responsible for a fourth of all cases in India. But air pollution–including ambient and household pollution due to biomass burning–is the primary cause of COPD in India and is responsible for more than half (53%) of all cases.

The ambient particulate pollution in India rose 12.5% over 27 years to 2017, from 80 μg/m3 (microgram per cubic metre) in 1990 to 90 μg/m3 in 2017, whereas China reduced its ambient particulate pollution from 58 μg/m3 to 53 μg/m3 over the same period.

These are “population weighted annual means” measuring fine particles, either dust or smoke, that penetrate the innermost recesses of the lungs. Averaged across the country, these data give weight to areas in proportion to their population, so that greater weight is given to areas where more people live. But these averages mask local concentrations of toxic air that may be many times more than the average.

In addition, more than 266 million Indians use tobacco, according to a 2018 World Health Organisation factsheet, and while the most common way to die of tobacco is from cardiovascular disease (48%), the next is chronic respiratory disease (23%), which includes COPD.

Although the proportion of any smoking among men aged 15 to 69 in India fell 27% over 12 years to 2010, cigarette smoking rose two fold in that age group and four fold in the 15-29 age group, according to a 2016 paper in BMJ Global Health, a journal.

“Despite modest decreases in smoking prevalence, the absolute numbers of male smokers aged 15-69 years has increased substantially over the last 15 years,” said the paper. Iyer started smoking when he was 17 and did not quit until a year before he was diagnosed with COPD.

A compounding factor in COPD’s rise in India is its ageing population, since there is growing evidence that susceptibility rises with age.

Over 21 years to 2011, the number of Indians above the age of 60 rose 93% from 53.7 million to 103.8 million. The decadal growth in elderly population between 2001 and 2011 was 35.5%, compared to 17.7% growth in the general population.

As the country ages and air pollution rises, COPD is likely to be increasingly common in India, experts told IndiaSpend.

India now accounts for a third (32%) of all disability adjusted life years (DALYs)–an indicator of overall disease burden–for COPD worldwide. Over 26 years to 2016, there was a 54% rise in the share of COPD in India’s total disease burden, as COPD moved up from being the eighth-leading cause of death to the second, according to the 2017 India: Health of the Nation’s States report by the Public Health Foundation of India (PHFI), a think tank, and the Indian Council for Medical Research, a government-run network of research laboratories.

Within this rise of COPD, there are medical nuances that explain why the disease is poorly understood, even by doctors, and poorly managed, claiming more Indian lives than it should.

Why so many Indians die of COPD

When Iyer felt the first shortness of breath, constant cough and tiredness in 2006, he went to a cardiologist who suspected it to be respiratory and cardiac related. The doctor prescribed medicines for both and despite symptoms getting worse, Iyer continued to work and travel. 

Two years later, when he was alone, Iyer’s blood sugar levels dropped and he asked his driver to take him to a hospital. There, a number of tests later, his condition was correctly diagnosed as COPD.

It should not have taken two years for a diagnosis because Iyer has been a smoker since he was 17 and smoked, as we said, up to 60 cigarettes a day for 40 years.

As in Iyer’s case, a classic COPD symptom is shortness of breath, although other symptoms can include fatigue, cough and tightness of the chest. Patients feel short of breath because the tubes carrying oxygen to air sacs in the lungs are inflamed–chronic bronchitis–or because smoke damages these sacs, which is emphysema.

Either way, the lungs do not expel carbon dioxide or absorb oxygen as they should, even as airways are inflamed, making breathing difficult. This is especially difficult for older patients.

“At the age of 25, our lungs are at their optimum efficiency [taking in] around four to six litres [of air with every breath]; from then on, it gradually declines about 25-30 ml per year,” said H B Chandrashekar, director of the Jain Institute of Pulmonology and Sleep Medicine at the Bhagwan Mahaveer Jain Hospital, Bengaluru. “For smokers, this is two or three times faster, so about 80-90 ml decline each year,” said H B Chandrashekar.

So, by the time a smoker reaches the age of 45, the lung capacity is equivalent to a 75-year old’s, he said. Iyer, as we said, was 58 when diagnosed.

All his adult life, Iyer’s mother and friends told him to quit smoking. In 2007, he finally did. A year later, he was diagnosed with COPD. By then, he was in the second stage of the disease, meaning his COPD was moderate with symptoms worsening on exertion.

COPD patients say they are perfectly normal before but the fact is that lung function has been on decline that hey noticed because of aging, said Rajani Bhat, consultant physician, pulmonologist and critical-care-medicine specialist, who treated Iyer for eight years.

“Usually patients come to COPD as an exacerbation of a bad lung infection,” said Rajani Bhat, consultant physician, pulmonologist and critical-care-medicine specialist, who treated Iyer for eight years. “They say that they were perfectly normal before, but the fact is that their lung function has been on a decline for sometime, but they felt it only later because of aging.”

If caught early, ideally in full body health checks that include lung-function tests, COPD can be treated and managed through inhalers, usually bronchodilators, that open airways and make breathing easier, even though there is no direct cure.

There are several reasons why COPD is not diagnosed early by most Indian doctors:
 

• It is often confused with asthma because it has some similar symptoms: shortness of breath, wheezing, cough and chest tightness.
• Diagnosis is confirmed with a test called spirometry–measuring how much and how fast the lungs exhale–which is not commonly available in India.
• Most doctors assume only smokers are at risk, thus underestimating the risk to non-smokers who contract it due to biomass burning and occupational hazards like working in mining, textiles, welding, foundry and farming.
• COPD patients are often misdiagnosed as having asthma and are given inhalers for asthma that is corticosteroid inhalers which do not work.
• COPD often progresses into heart disease, which may be treated but the underlying lung disease remains undiagnosed.

“In our own study, we found that 25% of patients admitted with myocardial infarction [heart attack] had an underlying lung disease which was not known,” said B V Murali Mohan, Consultant, Pulmonology and Internal Medicine, at Narayana Health, Bengaluru.

Unlike heightened general awareness of India’s number one killer–cardiovascular disease–COPD is seldom written about in the popular media.
“It (COPD) is not considered of reader or viewer interest,” said Srinath Reddy, PHFI president. Coupled with poor diagnosis in primary care, confusion with other respiratory diseases and “low self referrals” by patients, COPD is an ill-understood disease, said Reddy.

Living with COPD

Iyer has watched COPD gradually take over his life.

From stage two in 2008, the disease within him has progressed to stage four, which means it is now in very severe stage where hospitalisations are frequent and lung function is limited.

Over the last four years, he has been hospitalised 10 times, mostly with a lung infection or low oxygen saturation in the blood.

In 2019, Iyer has only been hospitalised in January.

“They say if you have not been hospitalised for more than six months, you are doing well,” said Iyer. He has become adept at managing his disease at home, adjusting his BiPAP machine, running his nebuliser, which deliver medication to open his airway in a fine mist, and has avoided going to the hospital.

“Most patients, especially women, do not want to burden their children and family (and) hence wait till it is too late to see a doctor,” said Bhat, Iyer’s doctor. This is being penny wise, pound foolish, she said, since regular follow-ups ensure patients do not need to be hospitalised frequently.

Since most COPD cases in India are detected late and in stage 2 and beyond, they need frequent hospitalisation, especially in winter.

Iyer spends between Rs 10,000-15,000 every month on managing COPD, but each hospitalisation that usually lasts a week can cost between Rs 60,000-100,000.

Apart from the medical paraphernalia that keeps him alive, opposite his bed is a blackboard, on which daughter-in-law Antara Karthikeyan has written a list of medicines he needs to take every day and in case of an emergency.

Raj Iyer’s COPD was first thought to be a cardio-respiratory problem. By the time he was diagnosed with COPD, two years later–a year after he quit smoking–the disease was in its second stage, at which point there were moderate symptoms that worsened on exertion.

Given his research background–he has a master of philosophy degree in social anthropology–Iyer has studied the disease’s mechanism extensively and answered questions on treatment and medicines with ease.

“To treat COPD, doctors prescribed steroids, which in-turn bring on diabetes and osteoporosis,” said Iyer. “Because COPD makes you breathless, you are less active, which further weakens bones and muscles.”

Inhalers do not cause these side-effects; only the oral steroids, said Bhat, his doctor. “Iyer has to take oral steroids for his exacerbations and he has had to take them over a long period of time” she added. “However he wouldn’t be alive, if not for those medications.”

Yet, COPD detected early can be managed, and patients can hope for better quality of life.

Pulmonary rehabilitation

An intervention that works as effectively, if not better, than medication for COPD is pulmonary rehabilitation, which includes a 12-week programme of exercises for chronic lung patients under medical supervision, nutritional counselling and breathing techniques.

Exercise improves a patient’s breathing capacity by working muscles that become deconditioned due to disuse; it “empowers” patients and gives them confidence, so they can be independent, explained pulmonologist H B Chandrashekar of Bhagwan Mahaveer Jain Hospital  who set up Bengaluru’s first, and one of India’s earliest, pulmonary rehabilitation centres in 2012 in the hospital.

“Exercise reduces chance of exacerbation, hospitalisation, improves symptoms and even may reduce mortality,” says pulmonologist H B Chandrashekar of Bhagwan Mahaveer Jain Hospital, Bengaluru. He set up the city’s first, and one of India’s earliest, pulmonary rehabilitation centres in 2012.

“Exercise reduces chance of exacerbation, hospitalisation, improves symptoms and even may reduce mortality,” said Chadrashekar. Most patients are reluctant to go into rehab, as they consider it unnecessary, and most hospitals do not have such a centre, since it does not bring in as much revenue as hospital beds do, he said.

Living in Bengaluru possibly took a greater toll on Iyer’s health. Pulmonologists explained how Bengaluru’s unique weather and geographical conditions make its residents especially prone to respiratory illness.

While air pollution is not as high as in New Delhi or in other northern cities–15 of which rank among 20 of the world’s most-polluted cities–Bengaluru’s altitude of 3,020 ft or 920 m above sea level and equable climate ensure pollutants do not rise, as they would in warmer weather, but stay close to the ground.

“The treeline in the city, with trees on both sides of the road, are the city’s lungs [but] also trap the pollutants close to the breathing zone,” said Bhat. The city’s high pollen concentration makes residents prone to allergies, asthma and COPD.

When Iyer was first recommended pulmonary rehabilitation in 2008, he didn’t take it seriously. In 2015 when his condition worsened, he went to Mahaveer Jain Hospital and accepted the rehabilitation.

He went to the hospital in a wheelchair with oxygen support; slowly he weaned himself off the wheelchair and constant oxygen support. In 2015, he felt better and was physically capable of doing more.

Iyer pointed out that insurance companies do not cover pulmonary rehabilitation. “They are willing to cover COPD and pay tonnes and tonnes of money, if you claim insurance,” he said. “But (they) will not pay for rehab that will prevent hospitalisation and save them money.”

The rehab costs Rs 1,000 a week, during which there are three one-hour sessions. Iyer paid for and continued rehab sessions for a year and was strong enough to achieve important milestones: his son’s wedding, buying property and travelling.

However, after a series of falls and injuries, he was not able to continue rehab after 2017. As his conditioned worsened, a greater burden is apparent on his family.

How families cope with COPD

COPD has altered the way Iyer’s family lives.

His son and daughter-in-law cannot, for instance, travel out of the city at the same time.

Daughter-in-law Antara Karthikeyan was once a retail manager with long working hours, but she was constantly worried about Iyer home alone.
“My number one concern was, what if he trips and falls,” said Antara Karthikeyan. “He cannot get up on his own. How will he call us?”

Her decision to become a kindergarten teacher, so she could return home by afternoon, was a personal choice, she said. She and her husband have hired help to look after their four-year-old daughter, Tanya, and be available in case Iyer needs assistance while Antara Karthikeyan is at work.

COPD does not affect only the lungs but causes wider systemic damage because of inflammation. The disease has brought gastritis, diabetes, oedema, sleep disturbance, anxiety and depression to Iyer, who uses music, reading books, watching documentaries and meditation as a way of making peace with his body’s slow degeneration.

This is the third of a four-part series. You can read the first part here and the second part here. 

Reporting for this article was supported by the REACH Lilly Media Fellowship Programme on Non Communicable Diseases.

This story was first published here on Healthcheck.

(Yadavar is a special correspondent with IndiaSpend.)

Courtesy: India Spend

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What are the major policy concerns on energy, water, environment, pollution and climate change India would face even as the new government under Prime Minister Narendra Modi takes over? Joydeep Gupta, South Asia Director, The Third Pole, a project initiated by China Dialogue and Earth Journalism Network, takes a look:

Energy

Clean energy and clean mobility are set to get a big boost, and the government may take steps to address the short-term pains that have been caused by recent policy moves by the outgoing government. These moves have stalled the rollout of new solar and wind energy projects. There has been a big policy push for electrification of public transport, but makers of private e-vehicles see this as having happened at their cost.

Coal-fired power plants will continue to function, and there will probably be no fresh move to retire coal plants beyond those already slated for retirement. At the same time, there will be no encouragement to set up new coal-fired power plants.

A huge boost to increase availability of cooking gas is expected. Distribution of nearly 13 million free cooking gas cylinders to poor homes is seen by the BJP as one of the two welfare measures that enabled it to return to power. This scheme is stalling, due to a shortage of replacement cylinders, and the BJP knows this problem needs to be sorted out quickly.

Another scheme that is seen as a success is the one to build 18 million toilets. While the pace of construction has been impressive, the scheme is running into problems because of a lack of sewerage connections, and more importantly, a lack of water.

Water

Water is going to become a bigger problem every day – one-third of India is in the middle of a drought right now, most acute in Maharashtra.

The outgoing government’s attempts to get farmers to move to drip irrigation have not worked. It is unclear if these attempts will be strengthened. It is clear that the BJP will accelerate its pet scheme to interlink India’s rivers and transfer water from the east to the west of the country. Experts have repeatedly stated, and shown, that such a scheme would be unworkable, dangerous and unsustainable, but the ruling party is set upon it.

The new government will accelerate dam building in Jammu and Kashmir in the Indus basin, while sticking to the letter of the Indus Waters Treaty between India and Pakistan. This includes dams with reservoirs on the tributaries of the Ravi – one of the three eastern rivers of the Indus basin. Under the treaty, the waters of the eastern rivers are allocated to India. It also includes run-of-the-river projects on the Chenab and its tributaries, based on the argument such schemes do not hold back water. The Chenab is one of the three western rivers whose waters are allocated to Pakistan under the treaty. Pakistan has been protesting, and so have local residents who have been displaced by the schemes. But the government looks set to continue.

Some hope has been expressed in Bangladesh that India may now sign the Teesta water sharing treaty because the BJP has made significant inroads into the contiguous Indian state of West Bengal, especially in the areas through which the Teesta flows. But policy observers in New Delhi think this setback is likely to make West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee (one of the most prominent opposition leaders) even more determined to oppose the treaty. There is an added complication – before West Bengal, the Teesta flows through the Himalayan state of Sikkim, where the ruling party has been voted out after 20 years in power in April 2019. The party that will now be in power is supported by residents who were displaced by the dams and are still protesting about it. The attitude the new state government will take towards the series of dams on the Teesta in Sikkim is not known yet.

No one in New Delhi expects a quick change in the relationship between China and India on the Brahmaputra basin – the largest of the transboundary river basins shared by the two countries. Water policy advisers also think the relationship between India and Nepal on transboundary basins will continue in its old muddled way, while New Delhi will continue to push Kathmandu for quick completion of hydroelectricity projects slated to sell power to India.

The outgoing government failed to clean India’s holiest river Ganga – not to talk of other rivers – despite giving the matter a lot of publicity. It may try to make another big attempt, though experts fear that there are now so many dams near the headwaters of all rivers that they simply do not carry enough water in non-monsoon months to flush out pollutants. Since no one expects the government to decommission dams, all policy observers are emphasising the need to make sewage and industrial effluent treatment plants really work. While useful, this is the same approach that various governments have pursued over three decades, and the Ganga is filthier than ever.

The new government is expected to give a boost to inland water transport. While this is welcomed by almost all, there are concerns about the sustainability of dredging rivers for navigation, when most of the rivers in northern India – notably the Brahmaputra and the Ganga – carry huge sediment loads from the Himalayas, the world’s youngest mountain. There are additional concerns whether the concerns of local communities, such as fisherfolk, are being incorporated into the framework, which will have an impact on the resilience of local communities and eco-systems.

Environment

In 2014, the BJP-led government started by making it easier for entrepreneurs to start factories or mines or to build roads and dams in designated forest areas. Despite criticism from environmentalists, this policy was not only continued but strengthened almost at the end of the term of the outgoing government. Now that the BJP has won a second term, environmentalists are worried that the process of felling trees to make way for infrastructure projects will be accelerated. India is already failing to keep its Paris climate pledge when it comes to planting trees. If the current policy continues, it will fall further back. A notification to amend the process for Environment Impact Assessments released during the midst of elections seems to signal further weakening of environmental protection.

This September, there may be a lot of talk by the government on pushing back the desert, as New Delhi hosts the once-in-two-years summit of the UN Convention to Combat Desertification. What this will mean in the expanding arid and semi-arid zones of India remains to be seen.

Pollution

Air pollution is one issue that figured prominently in the election manifesto of the BJP as well as that of the main opposition Congress party. The BJP manifesto said, “We have evolved technologically better strategies and devices to map the level of pollution in cities and rivers and have taken effective steps to reduce the level of pollution in major cities, including the national capital. We will convert the National Clean Air Plan into a Mission and we will focus on 102 most polluted cities in the country. Through concerted action, we will reduce the level of pollution in each of the mission cities by at least 35% over the next five years.” The party also promised to “work towards completely eliminating crop residue burning to reduce air pollution.” Whether these promises will actually be delivered on is something one has to wait and see.

Pollution of soil and of food are rising concerns – partly as a consequence of soil pollution and partly due to indiscriminate use of chemicals including on livestock, but these have not been publicly discussed. This is becoming a major public health issue – and doctors are hoping for concerted action. But policymakers confessed that they have not really been thinking about it seriously enough.

Solid waste management – especially in cities – remains a huge and unaddressed challenge. It is unlikely that the federal government will do anything significant about it. All policymakers asked about it said this was the job of municipalities and the centre could do little more than help.
Climate change

In many ways, the impacts of climate change actually drove India’s election campaign this April and May, though it was never acknowledged in so many words. In the wake of the BJP victory, policymakers were confident that the government would accelerate moves to adapt to climate change impacts – such as rolling out climate-resilient crop varieties. Asked about mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions, they talked of India’s ambitious plan to generate 225 GW through renewable energy sources by 2022 or even 2020. As for India’s stance at global climate negotiations, the policymakers described it as a non-partisan issue and did not expect any change.

Courtesy: Counter View

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The Paryavaran Suraksha Samiti (PSS) has sent a notice to the Narmada Control Authority, the Environment Subgroup of Narmada Control Authority, Executive Member and Member (E&R) of Narmada Control Authority, Sardar Sarovar Narmada Nigam Ltd, the Chief Secretary of Gujarat State, the Chairman and Member Secretary of Central Pollution Control Board, the Chairman and Member Secretary of Gujarat Pollution Control Board on April 12, 2019 expressing their concerns regarding the deteriorating condition of the once-perennial Narmada river and have demanded certain measures to be taken in the interest of the lives, livelihoods and environment in the affected areas of Narmada in the state of Gujarat. The notice has been sent after an investigation study was conducted by the PSS on the quality of water flowing in the Narmada river downstream of Sardar Sarovar Dam (SS) on April 6, 2019 between 11.00 am to 04.00 pm.

The study has revealed that the once-perennial Narmada river has been reduced to a seasonal river mainly due to the construction of the SSD, the Statue of Unity (SoU), Garudeshwar Weir (GW) dam and other tourism projects without taking into account their environmental impacts. The construction of the GW has started without any environmental impact assessment while the SoU has been built in the middle of the river without any impact assessments and public consultations. Worse still, various tourism projects are coming up around the SoU thereby increasing the threat on the already vulnerable Narmada river.

The study has further found that the SSP, which was initiated as an environmentally sustainable development project, is also planned without considering its impact on the 161 kilometres long downstream stretch of the Narmada river falling in the state of Gujarat. The SSP and GW are controlling the flow of water and silt downstream. Further, the PPS states that the Rs. 4,350 crore Bhadbhut Barrage project, aimed at stopping the salinity ingress, will instead destroy the estuary and the livelihoods of thousands of people. Also, the objective of achieving navigation is unlikely to be met due to a very little flow from the SSD.

Thus, a combination of all these projects is killing the downstream stretch due to  polluted sea water ingress, untreated sewage and solid waste pollution. There is no fresh water in the downstream which is filled only with sewage and industrial wastewater. The industrial effluents are discharged from Ankleshwar, Jhagadia, Panoli, and Dahej industrial clusters which are notorious for their non-compliance of prescribed standards for effluent discharges. The river is now prone to flash floods with a dry river bed stretch. 
The situation is acute. So much so, that now the Narmada river is ending at Village Garudeshwar instead of at the Arabian Sea further down, 161 Kilometres away. This is severely impacting the ecology, biodiversity, fishery, livelihoods of the fisherfolks, downstream villagers, tribals, natural and cultural resources, wildlife sanctuary and lakhs of other people living close to and dependent on the river directly or indirectly.

The detailed findings of the study are:

 
The above table, clearly indicates TDS 647 – 5,000 – 20,000 – 25,500 mg/l, COD 40 – 100 – 150 mg/l and DO of 4.49 to 7 mg/l of the Narmada River. The downstream stretch is in a seriously grim condition and all the concerned authorities are to be blamed for this state of abject neglect. The groundwater was also tested which showed a TDS of 1610 mg/l which has severely impacted the quality of water in the wells and borewells of the surrounding areas.

The concerned authorities have accepted various studies and progress reports at face value without even verifying them. Further, the authorities believed that releasing 600 cusecs of water in the downstream would be enough and allowed the water to be released from the Godbole gate instead of the dam, which should have been the case. They further permitted for the water to not be released from Gujarat’s share, as stipulated by the Narmada Water Dispute Tribunal (NWDT), which means that currently Gujarat is not sharing anything to the downstream river. Ironically, it keeps on writing letters to the concerned authorities asking for more water. Recently, it has written to the Narmada Control Authority to increase the water released in the downstream to 1500 cusecs, which is also an ad hoc figure, for its survival.

The PPS has demanded for the formation of an expert committee to assess the sustainable ecological flow required in the river for different seasons in order to ensure that it does not dry up in the downstream stretch up to the Gulf of Khambhat. The investigation study reveals that various authorities have failed in performing their duties and thus, have demanded the following:
 

1. All concerned authorities should release 4000 cusecs of water in the downstream from the SSD as it is the minimum quantity required to rejuvenate and improve the condition of the river.
2. The release of the industrial effluents and sewage should be stopped immediately.
3. Appointment of a high level and empowered committee for the day-to-day monitoring and evaluation of the quality of the downstream stretch of the river and the groundwater in the surrounding areas.
4. Appointment of a high level and empowered committee for the ecological restoration and rejuvenation of the Narmada river.
5. Providing exemplary monetary compensation to the affected people including the fisherfolks, villagers and farmers.
6. Appointment of a competent and empowered committee to assess the ongoing and past damages to quantify the real compensation for the affected masses.
7. Implementation of the Supreme Court order in the writ petition dated 22.02.2017, of the Supreme Court in Writ Petition (Civil) No. 375 of 2012 (Paryavaran Suraksha Samiti & Anrs V/s Union of India & Ors) which clearly states that the concerned Pollution Control Board should initiate civil or criminal action against the polluting industries and shut them down if they fail to meet effluent norms.
8. Direct the Gujarat government to shut down the work on the Garudeshwar Weir, Bhadbhut Weir and tourism projects related to the SoU till an independent assessment is conducted followed by public consultations and appraisals.

The notice states, “these projects now have grave adverse impacts on the Narmada Estuary and unless all the possible impacts are properly studied and if the State fails to have mitigation plans; we stare at a grim situation of a dying Narmada that we killed with our apathy and greed.” It further ensures to take legal action against the concerned authorities in case appropriate steps are not taken to protect the river, biodiversity and the lives of the affected masses.
There is a surging anger among the villagers who live in over 160 villages along the river; yet the narrow contours of politics within Gujarat has prevented the state and condition of the Narmada river from being made into a burning poll issue. Opportunities that present themselves at election time, for the opposition, are being squandered.
 
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