Civil Society News, Gurugram
Published: Jan. 14, 2023
Prescient votaries of careful development in the fragile ecology of the Himalayas have been cautioning against the building of wide roads and hydropowerdam projects. But both have been happening on a scale that mountains can’t cope with. https://www.civilsocietyonline.com/interviews/all-good-advice-on-joshimath-was-ignored-says-ravi-chopra/
Ravi Chopra’s has been one such voice over the past 34 years.An engineer with an IIT degree, he set up the People’s Science Institute in Dehradun in1988. More recently, he was on an expert committee appointed by the Supreme Court to study the impact of hydropower dam projects in the Himalayas. He finally chose to resign from the committee in 2021 because he felt the government was impervious to scientific advice.
After the state of Uttarakhand was formed, to boost tourism, infrastructure wasenhanced, and the population of the town increased to
around 20,000-25,000. The care that mountain towns and cities require was not given. The Mishra Committee’s recommendation not to deforest was forgotten.
To make the slopes attractive to skiers in Auli, which lies above Joshimath, the slope was ‘designed’ and a ropeway was built. In 2009, I think, the first signs of a major disaster occurred— the sudden leakage of water from the hillside which is traced to the tunnel boring machine of the Tapovan-Vishnugad project that seems to have punctured an aquifer.
We said that at roughly 2,200 m elevation, dams should not be built. Later we revised it to beyond the main central thrust. That means beyond Helang in this valley, dam construction should not take place.
Of course, the government does not listen to all this.