SulabhENVIS Centre

Surajkund is now dry and desolate and Damdama is going the same way. It’s a man-made disaster that could have been avoided.

Once these were the city’s favourite picnic spots, big attractions around Delhi — Badkhal Lake, Surajkund and Damdama Lake. No more. All these water bodies have become stone dry. The reason: hectic and indiscriminate mining in the Aravalis. Surajkund and its adjoining lake, Badkhal, dried up a year ago. And now Damdama too has shrivelled up —farmhouses are coming up on its dry bed.
   The greed of man — both for mining stones and grabbing land — is causing an ecological disaster in the Faridabad district of Haryana.
   The lakes at Surajkund and Badkhal were popular getaways for Delhi-ites and others because of their water bodies. Today, locals play cricket while villagers graze cattle on their dry beds.
   The residents of the area — who have seen the tourist flow getting reduced to a trickle over the years — complain that no effort was ever made to maintain the water flow to the historical Surajkund built in 10th century by King Surajpal of Tomar Dynasty to catch ‘‘the rain water from the hills’’.
   According to ASI officials, since the Kund has dried up, the complex hardly attracts any tourists except during the crafts mela. ‘‘The Kund has dried upsince the natural rain water supply chain has been blocked because of constructions. So, the water lost due to evaporation and natural recharge of groundwater was never replenished adequately,’’ said a tourism department official, who did not wish to be named.
   The Surajkund and Badkhal lakes, of course, have been killed by the unregulated mining all across the Aravalis — in Faridabad and Gurgaon — prior to Supreme Court imposing a blanket ban. ‘‘Since the gaping mine holes were never rehabilitated, the rain water does not reach the water bodies or, for that matter, even Damdama Lake. In many areas, the mining pits have breached the groundwater level and hence slowly these water bodies dried up,’’ said Conservator of Forests R P Balwan.
   An alarm had been sounded in the hydrological report submitted by the Ministry of Environment in its affidavit before the forest bench of Supreme Court in August last year. It had mentioned that these used mining pits were found ‘‘filled with water’’ leading to ‘‘massive evaporation of groundwater’’ — about 8.86 lakh ccm of fresh water. The report was prepared by the Chandigarh office of the Central Ground Water Board. It had also mentioned that ‘‘mining was mainly carried out below the water table by pumping out of groundwater’’ and ‘‘dewatering of the mines had affected the groundwater regime, resulting in depletion of groundwater resources’’.

‘‘The natural drainage pattern has also altered due to mining and dumping of waste material,’’ the report stated.
   R K Srinivasan, a researcher with the Centre for Science and Environment, too blames the indiscriminate mining. ‘‘Surajkund and Badkhal lakes dried up due to mining, massive quarrying and colonisation. We need to urgently restore the catchment area and to go for large-scale watershed management.’’
   Experts also point out that the Aravali rocks are predominantly quartzite which don’t have porosity. ‘‘These rocks also don’t have permeability meaning they don’t have the capacity to allow flow of water in between grains,’’ said an expert. Earlier, when natural sources were active, these factors were not so relevant.
   Groundwater board officials warn that the drying up of these lakes doesn’t augur well for the water supply to the twin cities. While Faridabad is 100% dependent on groundwater, Gurgaon gets 40% of its supply from under the ground.

Less rainfall Mining in catchment area hinders rain water flow to the lakes Water collected in empty mining pits gets evaporated and does not recharge ground water table.
Aravali rocks are predominantly quarsite and hence lack porosity — capacity to retain water.
They also lack permeability and does not allow flow of water between grains. THEN... This was the kund in Surajkund in 2004 when the water had already started receding ...AND NOW In 2009, the water has disappeared completely, and unlike in previous years the number of visitors has got reduced to a trickle ONCE THERE WAS A LAKE: There’s no water in Surajkund Lake anymore; it’s now become a grazing ground. With Badkhal Lake dead, boats have been dumped outside; (right) villagers have got designs on the land next to Damdama.

New Delhi: India’s rising consumption level is edging the country into a nutritional black hole. With greater amounts of money in hand to spend, as the quick estimates of national accounts for 2007-08 show, people have begun moving away from cereals, proteins and other healthy foods towards beverages and addictive items like tobacco.
   Alarm bells would be ringing about how India’s nutritional security may be getting challenged even as its economic security gets better. For a country that still can’t provide enough for its poor, the results threaten that the rich and middle classes could be heading towards the other end of the spectrum — spending on unhealthy food.
   The statistics on private final consumption expenditure — an indication of consumer spending trends — showed that the spending on food, beverages and tobacco continued to be the largest chunk of household budgets, at about 42.3%, in 2007-08. But it has come down compared to 2000-2001, when it stood at 48.2%.
   The expenditure on cereals & bread has shown a decline from 11.7% in 2000-01 to 9.6% in 2007-08. Spending on pulses has dipped from 1.2% to 1.1% and on fruits & vegetables from 9.5% to 7.7% between the same period. Similar is the case for other health food as spending on milk & milk products has declined from 7.1% to 6.2% and on meat, egg & fish from 4.0% to 3.7% between 2000-01 to 2007-08.
   On the contrary, spending on unhealthy things like beverages, pan & intoxicants has increased from 1.6% in 2000-01 to 3.1% in 2007-08. Similarly, spending on hotels & restaurants has also shown increase from 1.9% to 2.6% in the same period. With growing economy, India is spending more on services as the data reflects that the fastest growing components of household spending were related to the service sector, such as healthcare, communications and education. Consumers tend to spend relatively less on food and more on healthcare and education as their incomes increase.
   The quick estimates for 2007-08 of national output, spending, saving and investment released by the Central Statistical Organisation (CSO) reflect clear hike in spending on medical care & health services which grew from 4.7% in 2000-01 to 5.7% in 2007-08. During the same period, transportation and communication expenditure grew from 14.4% to 16.3% of the total household expenditure. Similarly, spending on recreation, education & cultural services has gone up from 3.7% to 5% of the Rs 26,05,859 crore consumption expenditure in the domestic market in 2007-08. Also, private consumption expenditure on durables (furniture, furnishings, appliances and services) grew from 3.3% to 4% during the same period.

New Delhi: It’s an alternative that is likely to work. Showing their concerns for eco-friendly practices, some resident welfare associations (RWA) are going all out to promote jute bags over plastic bags. RWAs of Dilshad Garden, Defence Colony and C R Park have approached an NGO, Chetanalaya, to provide jute bags to them which they will provide to residents of their colonies.
   According to Chetanalaya, soon after the plastic bans, queries for supplying jute bags have gone up in the city. Said Shaji Mathew, project coordinator, Green Shopper campaign: ‘‘Usually, we sell the bags for Rs 30 and they have a guaranteed life of six months. Many shopkeepers have approached us but they want cheaper jute bags costing between Rs 10 and Rs 15. We are now looking at making lowcost bags which will be available by February 15.’’
   These bags are made in West Bengal and the NGO has been supplying these bags to around 30 schools for the past one year in an effort to create awareness on ecofriendly options to plastic bags.
Said Mattew: ‘‘The school uniforms and books of children are given to them in jute bags. There are around 30 schools to whom we are supplying these bags and we will rope in many more in the coming days. In November, 2008, we had started a pilot project and provided these bags to 1,000 Mother Dairy outlets but thereafter demand for more did not come in. These things take time to catch up and with the ban, I am sure the switch will become more visible in the a month’s time. It also works to the advantage of shopkeepers who will save up to Rs 4,000 that they usually spend on purchasing plastic bags.’’
   Mathew said: ‘‘RWAs from Dilshad Garden, Defence Colony have contacted us and we are hoping to provide these bags to malls also.’’
   Said Romi Dhawan, general secretary, Defence Colony RWA: ‘‘We are looking at placing orders for around 200 jute bags in different colours to make the switch from plastic bags possible. Depending on the popularity of these bags among residents we will place order for more bags. We will also create more awareness on this issue through newsletters. We have also asked the vendors in our colony to stop keeping plastic bags and ask people to bring baskets from their homes instead.’’

Dated : 2/4/2009
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Whether they are hit by an unexpected food crisis or a devastating hurricane, the world’s weakest states are the most exposed when crisis strikes. In the Failed States Index, Foreign Policy magazine and The Fund for Peace ranked 177 countries where state collapse may be just one disaster away.
Whether they are hit by an unexpected food crisis or a devastating hurricane, the world’s weakest states are the most exposed when crisis strikes. In the Failed States Index, Foreign Policy magazine and The Fund for Peace ranked 177 countries where state collapse may be just one disaster away. More...

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