The Union government is preparing a Rs 19,300 crore forestry intervention initiative to rejuvenate 13 major Indian rivers. The Indian government’s environment minister, Bhupender Yadav, has presented detailed project reports on the rejuvenation of 13 major rivers: Jhelum, Chenab, Ravi, Beas, Sutlej, Yamuna, Brahmaputra, Luni, Narmada, Godavari, Mahanadi, Krishna, and Cauvery.
The Indian Council of Forestry Research & Education, situated in Dehradun, prepared the reports, which were supported by the environment ministry’s National Afforestation & Eco-development Board. The 13 rivers that run through the country, mostly in the Himalayan and peninsular regions, cover a total basin area of 18,90,110 square kilometers, or 57.45% of the country’s geographical area.
According to the government, the growing water crisis caused by decreasing freshwater resources, particularly due to the shrinking and deterioration of river ecosystems, is a key hindrance to accomplishing national environmental, conservation, climate change, and sustainable development goals.
Deforestation and forest degradation, insufficient rainfall, flash floods, landslides, bank erosion, faulty agriculture and horticulture practices, soil erosion, excessive groundwater extraction, rapid urbanization, unregulated floodplain, waste dumping, effluent release, unregulated tourism, pilgrimage, unregulated sand mining, and riverbank encroachment are among the issues, according to the detailed project reports.
Is the plantation going to work?
The program is anticipated to be implemented through state forest departments as the nodal department, with other state line departments’ programs converged on the activities suggested in the comprehensive project reports and budgetary support from the Indian government. The plan is proposed to be implemented over a five-year period, with additional time set up for plantation care.
According to the full project reports, the expected increase in forest cover following the program might be around 7,417.36 sq km, with estimated increased carbon-dioxide sequestration of 50.21 million tons CO2 equivalent after 10 years and 74.76 million tons CO2 equivalent after 20 years.
They further claim that the scheme will result in annual groundwater recharge of 1,889.89 million cubic meters, sedimentation reduction of 64,83,114 cubic meters, and non-timber and other forest produce worth Rs 449.01 crores.
What do experts say about the project?
“This is just the old wine of afforestation in a new bottle,” Sharachchandra Lele, a distinguished fellow at the ATREE Centre for Environment and Development, said. Sharachchandra Lele conducts research on ecological and technological issues in forests, energy, and water resource management, among other things.
“Additionally, this is a top-down strategy that usurps governmental authority.” It’s a poor and undemocratic strategy… According to the Forest Rights Act of 2006, communities have the authority to decide what happens in their environments.
“The rivers are dead, dying, or degraded because they are killed first by huge dams, then by many smaller dams that block off environmental flows, industrial and domestic pollutants, climate change-driven glacier meltdown, and extreme weather events,” he said.
“Planting additional trees will not assist to solve these problems.” We can’t merely promote plantations as a panacea for all problems.”
“It seems like there will be the same old mindless plantations that will not survive, riverfront beautification which will concretize natural landscapes, tampering with grassland ecosystems and threat to locals,” Manshi Asher, a researcher with the Himdhara Environment Research and Action Collective, an advocacy and research group working on issues of environmental justice and forest rights in the Himalayan region, said.
“To truly rejuvenate rivers, we must address industrial pollution, sand mining, cease reckless dam construction, and safeguard existing forest ecosystems in the catchments,” says Asher.
Edited By : Khushi Thakur
Published By : Shubham Ghulaxe
