Discipline of the project: Uttarakhand

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Title: A study on Socio-psychological impact of Uttarakhand flood disaster Aim of the Project: The broad Aim of the project emphasi ing the o!erall thrust of the proposed in!estigation should be clearly mentioned" Statement of the Problem: The problem to be in!estigated should be clearly conte#tuali ed in the theoretical frame$ork of the discipline" %!er!ie$ of &iterature: To avert another Uttarakhand-type catastrophe, we must change course. We should stop pandering to the Indian elite's insatiable appetite for electricity, which is driving reckless dam construction, says raful !idwai

It will take years to roll back the physical, psychological, social, economic and ecological
damage wrought by the terrible floods in Uttarakhand, which killed more than 1,000 people. The deeper causes of this epic tragedy were not natural, but manmade. They ensured that cloudbursts and heavy rainfall, which routinely occur in Uttarakhand's upper hills, turned into a catastrophe. The causes include official policies and governance failures aggressive promotion and runaway growth of tourism! unchecked, unplanned development of roads, hotels, shops, mines and multi"storeyed housing in ecologically fragile areas! and above all, the planned development of scores of environmentally destructive hydroelectricity dams. This was an invitation to calamity. #y past e$perience as a member of the ministry of environment and forests' e$pert appraisal committee on river valley pro%ects confirms the contribution of dams, which is further discussed below. True, Uttarakhand's worst"affected areas e$perienced heavy rainfall of &'0"&(0 millimetres within )' hours on *une 1+"1(, leading to flash floods. ,ut this was far from unprecedented. Uttarakhand has recently recorded single"day rainfall in e$cess of '00 mm several times, including '-0 mm in 1..-, and .00 mm in 1.+-. /loudbursts, floods and rapid swelling of rivers too aren0t uncommon. This time, however, the floodwaters, laden with lakhs of tonnes of silt, boulders and debris from dam construction, found no other outlet than hundreds of villages and towns. 1ome buildings were covered under several feet of mud. 2ggravating this were two huge downpours of water and rocks from the high mountains, in all probability caused by glacier lake outburst floods 34567s8, which deluged

9edarnath. 4567s, or the e$plosive bursting of glacier lakes, are a conse:uence of human"induced climate change, which is causing rapid glacier melting in the ;imalayas. 2n early warning system, effective evacuation plans, and a responsive disaster management system would have prevented a massive loss of precious life. ,ut they weren't in place "" another governance failure. <elatively ine$pensive radar"based cloudburst forecasting technology would have given a three"hour warning. ,ut it wasn't installed because of inter"agency s:uabbles. The meteorological department has no reliable record of rainfall at specific locations from *une 1- onwards. In fact, according to media reports, 9edarnath didn't even have a rain gauge= >o evacuation plan was drawn up for Uttarakhand's vulnerable districts despite their recent history of disasters, including earth:uakes and floods. 2s the /omptroller and 2uditor 4eneral pointed out this past 2pril, the Uttarakhand ?isaster #anagement 2uthority, formed in 6ctober )00(, has never met or formulated @rules, regulations, polices or guidelines@. /learly, no lessons have been learnt either from the great earth:uakes of Uttarkashi 31..18 and /hamoli 31..A8, or recent ma%or flash foods and other monsoon"related disasters in Uttarkashi and <udraprayag districts, each involving death and destruction. The state government has Bealously promoted tourism to a point when tourist arrivals reached )- million, almost two"and"a"half times Uttarakhand's entire population of 10.A million, devastating the ecology and devouring tens of thousands of acres of forest land. ;otels, houses, shops and restaurants were recklessly built upon caving roadsides, steep slopes, and worst of all, on the flood plains of rivers. Cncroachment of these @natural boundaries@ of rivers is fraught with grave danger. Det, important government buildings, including a university, a radio station, a %ail and the head:uarters of the 1ashatra 1eema ,al, were built on flood plains. ;owever, the worst culprits are the large numbers of hydroelectric dams, which have spread like a rash in the basins of the 2lakananda, #andakini and ,hagirathi, and their tributaries. 2lready, says the ;industan Times, (0 dams have been built, including )& mega"pro%ects generating 100 #E or more. 2ccording to the >46 Feople's 1cience Institute, another +A0 dams are in various stages of commissioning, construction or planning. 1uch pro%ects involve drilling huge tunnels in the hills by blasting rocks, placing enormous turbines in the tunnels, cutting down forests to build water channels, roads, townships and other infrastructure, and laying transmission lines by other destructive methods. #any dams are built on the same river so close to one another that they leave no scope for the river's regeneration. ;ydroelectric dams steal water from people. They cause enormous destruction throughout their lifecycle, from intrusive construction, mining of building materials from riverbeds, muck disposal, debris dumping, and altering the hydrological cycle and

changing the natural course of rivers. Thus Uttarakhand's (0 completed dams have led to interference with +'0 kilometres of river water flows, e:uivalent to half the length of the state's ma%or rivers. ;ydroelectric dams have a profoundly negative impact on geology, especially in a ;imalayan hill state like Uttarakhand. To appreciate this, it's important to note that geologically, Uttarakhand is e$tremely fragile, being part of the world's youngest mountain range. #uch of the state lies in the seismically @most active@ Gones IH and H, with high tectonic activity that can suddenly alter the contours of land and the course of rivers. This greatly increases Uttarakhand's disaster potential. The state is prone to high"intensity rainfall events, including cloudbursts, flash floods and landslides. 2s 1outh 2sia >etwork on ?ams, <ivers and Feople puts it, it has a very large number of rapidly flowing silt"laden rivers that can turn into a ravaging, eroding, force of destruction if not handled carefully. Uttarakhand has a high proportion of its area under forests, which are necessary for the sustained e$istence of the local environment, people and biodiversity. Feople's livelihoods and water security depend on these natural resources. /limate change will aggravate matters. It will increase the fre:uency of e$treme weather events, including high rainfall. 2 study by the >ational 2tmospheric <esearch 5aboratory, Tirupati, shows a 1'.- percent rise per decade in the fre:uency of very heavy rain"events in India over 1.-1")00'. 2nother study, %ust released by the prestigious Fotsdam Institute for /limate Impact <esearch, says that with one degree /elsius global warming, daily variability in monsoon rainfall over India will increase by ' to 1) percent and by as much as 1& to -0 percent if global greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise unabated. Eith global warming on course to four degrees, the effects will be ruinous. The impact on Uttarakhand will be even greater because the ;imalayas are warming at least twice as fast as the globe. <apidly melting ;imalayan glaciers will release large :uantities of water into the 4angetic river system. Det, dam construction has taken place without factoring in these grave environmental haBards. In )00., the /24's audit of hydel pro%ects in Uttarakhand concluded '>o specific measures had been plannedIdesigned J to cope with the risk of flash floods. The adverse conse:uences of such Koods are acute as they cannot only damage the pro%ect structures but can cause loss of lives in low"lying downstream areasJ' The audit adds '4iven the current policy of the state government of pursuing hydro" power pro%ects indiscriminately, the potential cumulative effect of multiple run"of"river power pro%ects can turn out to be environmentally damaging.' 2 Eildlife Institute of India report 3)01)8 recommended that )' of the (0 Upper 4anga pro%ects should be shelved because of their high ecological impact. They together affect

nearly 10,000 hectares of land in this small state, and submerge more than &,+00 hectares of forests. 2ll these reports were ignored. It's not %ust the Uttarakhand government, but the /entre, too, that's to blame for this. The #oC7 has reduced the environmental impact assessment and appraisal processes to a farce. It routinely re%ects the recommendations of the statutory 7orest 2dvisory /ommittee. It recently changed its composition to destroy its integrity. In the 1..0s, when I was on the #oC7 e$pert appraisal committee on river valley pro%ects, not one of the doBens of pro%ects submitted to us had ade:uate documentation of impact on forests, wildlife, hydrology or rehabilitation of displaced people. 2ll of them had to be re%ected. ,ut the present C2/ has approved all of the )+) pro%ects placed before it between 2pril )00( and ?ecember )01), without a half"way credible evaluation of their impact. The compromised nature of this C2/ is revealed by the fact that its chairman F 2braham had to resign in ignominy in )010 because of a flagrant conflict of interest between his official role and his membership as a director of several hydropower companies being e$amined by the committee. 7aced with criticism of Upper 4anga pro%ects by environmentalists and affected people, the #oC7 recently appointed an Inter"ministerial 4roup, headed by ,9 /haturvedi. This has produced a wishy"washy report, which fails to analyse, even mention, the destructive potential of the pro%ects and the region's vulnerability to climate change. The report does not mandate cumulative impact assessment for all multiple"dam pro%ects, as distinct from the discrete impact of individual dams. It fails to uphold the basic principle that all rivers must be allowed to regenerate themselves by having a free" flowing length of five km between two dams. To avert another Uttarakhand"type catastrophe, we must change course. Ee should stop pandering to the Indian elite's insatiable appetite for electricity, which is driving reckless dam construction. 2ll dams should be stringently reviewed for environmental soundness. Until then, there must a moratorium on further construction. The problem identified should be logically linked to other studies on the theme in the literature delineating the need for the present in!estigation" 'onceptual (rame$ork: The concepts to be used) their rele!ance and applicability to the study and their operationalisation should be indicated"

Research *uestions or +ypotheses: The research ,uestions to be ans$ered- addressed need to be une,ui!ocally stated" Research Methodology (a)'o!erage: The proposal should clearly indicate the uni!erse of the study) sampling frame) sampling methods) sampling si e) units of obser!ation etc" (b)Data 'ollection: The proposal should indicate sources of data types of data) tools and techni,ues for collection of !arious categories of proposed data" (c) Data Analysis: .t should indicate the statistical techni,ues) if any) proposed to be used in data processing) specific packages for data analysis) content analysis) indices-scaling techni,ues proposed to be used etc" .mplications: The proposal should state $hether this research $ould bring forth any implications for policy making either for the region concerned or the country) any methodological inno!ations or contribute to theory building" References: The proposal should include a /&ist of References/ mentioned in the te#t along $ith other important recent additions to the literature on the theme" The references should indicate the author) title) publisher and year of publication" Duration of the Project: The duration of the project can be estimated depending upon the scope and si e of the project but should not exceed two years" .t should indicate the time needed for !arious tasks such as preparation of schedules) pilot study 0if any1) data collection) data analysis) report $riting etc" Personnel : .t should indicate the number and category of personnel needed for !arious tasks) their ,ualifications and the man-months needed $ith ade,uate justification" 2udget: This should indicate the cost of personnel) tra!el 0 no" of days and places $ith justification1) data processing) stationery and printing) books) journals) e,uipment) contingency and any other items" Summary: Five copies of Summary of the Research Proposal 0about 344 $ords1indicating the statements of the problem) objecti!e of the study) research ,uestions or hypothesis or both) sample si e 0if any1 and research methodology should be pro!ided" N. . (Kindly note that all the documents should be typed or word

processed (font:Tohima. size 12 point), singlesided, one and a half space on !"(#$ % 11$ or 21.& cm % 2# cm) whight paper. The length of the research proposal should not e%ceed eight pages and that of the biodata two pages.)