Madhav Gadgil Report on Western Ghats: CIC judgement

Sharing a report that was first published in DNA regarding the MoEF's efforts to give a quiet burial to the Madhav Gadgil report on Western Ghats.
Sabyasachi

The report govt wanted to bury in Western Ghats
Published: Wednesday, Apr 25, 2012, 13:22 IST
By Subir Ghosh | Place: Bangalore | Agency: DNA
The order of the Central Information Commissioner (CIC) asking the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) to “disclose” the ecological report of the Western Ghats Ecology Expert Panel (WGEEP) by May 5 is bound to have far-reaching consequences on “developmental” activity in the area.

The ministry, which had been sitting on the document since August 31, 2011 when the panel submitted its two-volume report, will now not be able to dilute the recommendations of the 14-member panel.The official line of the ministry so far had been that the “scientific or economic interests of the state” would be affected by “disclosure” (of the report). This was the stand taken by the ministry while responding to an RTI application filed by Kerala-based activist G Krishnan.

The CIC, Shailesh Gandhi, refused to accept the ruse offered by the MoEF. Gandhi, in his eight-page order, had remarked, “Mere apprehension of proposals being put forth by citizens and civil society who are furthering the cause of environment protection cannot be said to prejudicially affect the scientific and economic interests of the country. Disclosing a report or information does not mean that the government has to follow it. It may perhaps have to explain the reasons to public for disagreeing with a report based on logic and coherent reasons. This cannot be considered as prejudicially affecting the scientific and economic interests of the state.”

Conspiracy theories abounded since the panel, headed by Prof Madhav Gadgil, submitted its report. The belief among conservationists was that since the panel had explicitly warned against throwing open the ghats to developmental and industrial activities, the states affected were trying pleading with the Centre to dilute the recommendations.

Gadgil himself welcomed the CIC’s order, and felt that putting the document in the public domain would broaden the debate about the issue. “It was extremely unfair that the report was not made available to the public. At a time when state governments were said to be discussing the report, the public had to perforce remain in the dark.”

Wildlife biologist Sanjay Gubbi who works in the Western Ghats refused to hazard a guess as to why the government had not officially published the report, but went on to add, “There might have been pressure from various interest groups who would not want the recommendations of the panel to be implemented.”

The Western Ghats also known as Sahyadri Hills is a 1,600 km long mountain range running along the west coast of India. It covers the states of Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Goa, Maharastra and Gujarat.Covering approximately 1,40,000 sq km, these mountains are home to number of endemic plants and animal species. About 60% of the Western Ghats is in the state of Karnataka.

The WGEEP’s guidelines covered everything from mining and tourism to forest rights and hydel projects. Gandhi took cognisance of this and remarked in his order: “From the broad mandate of WGEEP, it is clear that its report would have extensive ramifications on the biodiversity of an ecologically-sensitive region as the Western Ghats. Moreover, as submitted by the PIO, areas covered by WGEEP and the recommendations given therein would influence many important sectors such as agriculture, land use, mining, industry, tourism, water resources, power, roads and railways”.

The panel designated the entire Western Ghats as an Ecologically Sensitive Area (ESA) and, assigned three levels of ecological sensitivity to different regions of it. These were termed as ecologically sensitive zone 1 (ESZ1), ecologically sensitive zone 2 (ESZ2) and ecologically sensitive zone 3 (ESZ3).It called for a a graded or layered approach, with regulatory as well as promotional measures appropriately finetuned to local ecological and social contexts within the broad framework of ESZ1, ESZ2 and ESZ3.

The elaborately laid-down sector-wise guidelines list out activities that could or could not be undertaken in different categories of ESZ. The WGEEP said no special economic zones should be set up or hill stations created across the ghats. It called for mining activities to be phased out from areas under ESZ1 and allow mining only to be set up in ESZ3 areas under strict supervision.

Among other things, the issue of mining was one of the most contentious, and words doing the rounds was that industry lobbies were trying hard to cajole the government into insisting that the WGEEP had exceeded its brief.

Gadgil, however, asserted, “We have not swayed from the mandate given to the panel at all.” In fact, the WGEEP possibly pre-empted this and had included an entire section in the final report about the mandate given to it by the government.

Recommendations
Land use

No Special Economic Zones; no new hill stations
No new non-agricultural land use to be permitted, except extension of existing village settlement areas to accommodate increase in population of local residents
Mining

No mining in areas demarcated as ESZ1; Where mining exists, it should be phased out by 2016
Illegal mining to be stopped immediately
No new mining in ESZ2; Existing mining under strict regulation and social audit
Biodiversity

Introduce incentive payments as “conservation service charges” for maintenance of sacred groves; Introduce incentive payments as “conservation service charges” for maintenance of biodiversity elements on private lands, lands under control of Biodiversity Management Committees, JFM lands, lands assigned as Community Forest Resources; Make special funds available to Biodiversity Management Committees.
Power/Energy

In ESZ1: no large storage dams, small bandharas are permissible; no new large wind projects or thermal power plants
Promote biomass based and solar sources for decentralized energy needs
Promote small scale, micro and pico hydropower systems, that are people owned & managed and are off grid