6 days ago
From cloudbursts to climate boiling: The price of ignoring Himalayas' warnings
The mountains are coming down. The fury with which the mountains are crumbling is worrisome but it doesn't seem to have hit where it needs to hit most. Policy makers will go on repeating what has been said umpteen times before – planning for development has to ensure safety of the fragile Western Himalaya's ecology.
While we can go on passing the buck, no one knows who has to protect the fragile ecology of the Western Himalayas. Who should be held accountable when a landside flattens a village, for instance? Let the responsibility be fixed.
In the last few days, heavy rains have not only wrecked havoc in the Uttarkashi district in Uttarakhand alone, but also inflicted heavy damages by a series of cloudbursts in Himachal Pradesh and Jammu & Kashmir. Frightening videos of a part of the Dharali village along the Bhagirithi river in Uttarkashi being swept by flash floods is a reminder of the calamity that is not only waiting to happen, but is already happening. That the mountains are vulnerable to destruction by the receding glaciers and the incessant digging and cutting of slopes along the highways was always known, but then only lip service has been accorded by the powers that be.
In an interesting tweet (now X) by the filmmaker Vinod Kapri shows how almost a year ago villagers along the Uttarkashi Gangotri-Harshil road had protested the planned felling of 6,500 deodar trees in the same region where tragedy has struck the Dharali village. The villagers had wanted the forest department as well as the Uttarakhand Government to reconsider its decision to axe the precious trees. But again, the narrative of development over ecology took over. The cost of 'development' has finally been borne by the Dharali village. Will those who recklessly cut down these trees to build a bypass in the Bhagirithi eco-sensitive zone be ever held responsible for the loss of life and property in the village that was swept away?
In another tweet, senior journalist Nidhi Jamwal, rightly questions the blame being shifted to recurring 'cloudbursts' in the Himalayas. Sudden and flash floods in the Himalayas are being blamed on the cloudbursts. But while the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has been asked to examine why the frequency of cloudbursts has gone up in the western Himalayas and the Indian Meteorological Division (IMD) has already clarified that a cloudburst only happens when 100 mm of rains falls in a small region, the fact remains that instead of blaming ourselves, we tend to look for alibis, even pointing to a cloudburst.
Several other studies have shown how the trees have been mercilessly cut in the Himalayas and for that matter across the country with no remorse for the catastrophe that can strike. Regardless of the loud warnings that have been sounded by the Supreme Court's committees to investigate the Kedarnath floods in 2013 and the Char Dham Pariyojana in 2019-20, these warnings are drowned in the 'development over ecology' narrative that I earlier talked about. But let us remember, as Ravi Chopra, the chair of the committee on Char Dham project, says: 'Recognising and respecting nature's boundaries is our safest, most logical route to survival and economic development.'
I find it also strange when permission is sought for restricting mining in the eco-sensitive zones which also requires displacement of tribals, for instance in Hasdeo block in Chhattisgarh, even the judiciary has refused to give interim stay saying 'please don't get in the way of development'. So whether it is the intelligentsia or the bureaucracy or political parties of any hue, the focus is invariably on deforestation using the same narrative of 'development versus ecology'. Once again, as the tribals are getting ready for the next round of protests in Chhattisgarh, and I am sure the development wallas will once again drown the cries of the protestors.
Anyway, going back to what we were discussing earlier. What Ravi Chopra said is a saner advice. Moreover, I don't think it is a cost too heavy to ensure development without disturbing the nature. It requires the planners to get over the greed that the construction companies and the political masters who lobby for these are trying to pressurise for. I remember when the Ministry for Environment and Forests, then headed by Environment Minister Kamal Nath, had included my name in a committee for river valley projects (from which I apologised as soon as my name was announced), a number of companies were quick to get in touch. I can therefore understand how difficult it is to ward-off the vested interests.
Those who believe that loss of forest cover can be compensated by fresh plantations; this recent study by IIT Bhubaneshwar (published on Aug 4, 2025) should serve as an eye-opener. Based on Copernicus Global Land Service Land Cover map, this study showed that India lost 18 times more forest cover than it gained. Or to put it the other way, for every 1 sq km of green cover gained by plantations between 2015 and 19, India lost 18 sq kms of forests.
'Our research clearly shows that most of the newly added forests during 2015 to 2019 were islets, highly fragmented and ecologically vulnerable patches. There is a need to move beyond the current quantity-based afforestation approach and explicitly incorporate structural connectivity into forest planning,' one of the authors of the study was quoted as saying in the media.
This coming at a time when India has already pledged before the UN Climate Change conference (Paris Convention) in 2015, to create an additional carbon sink of over 2.5 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2) by undertaking more afforestation activities by 2030. How fruitful will be the renewed afforestation exercise given the IIT study, clearly shows the tough challenges ahead.
The best way to ensure carbon sequestering therefore is to let the pristine trees survive. It doesn't make any sense to first cut down the trees and then seek carbon credits. This is a flawed concept of development. Some people in the developing countries, who undertake greening projects, cannot compensate or pay for industrial pollution in the western world and in the process earn carbon credits.
Let us also not on any case be swayed by newspaper articles that do not find any harm in disappearing snow from the mountain slopes. It is not only in the Himalayas, but even the Union Government's ambitious Great Nicobar project in the Andaman Nicobar islands, which is expected to take a massive toll of more than 9.5-lakh trees, clearly shows how deep sinking has been the narrative of development taking precedence over nature and ecology. Compensatory afforestation in faraway Haryana is no answer for the devastation that the islands will witness.
It has become so easy to blame climate change for the environmental damages we see. The day is not far off when mankind will eventually realise that the massive environmental devastations, are a consequence of its own making. Meanwhile, what has to be known is that as we go on pressing for higher growth and more development, the world has already moved ahead – from climate change to climate boiling.
(The author is a noted food policy analyst and an expert on issues related to the agriculture sector. He writes on food, agriculture and hunger)
